


No Game For Old Men - Book Four

by Ryk_Oakwine



Series: No Game For Old Men [4]
Category: Sekirei
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Dare to tell a new story, Embedded Images, F/F, F/M, Feels, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Multi, My alien sex slave is hotter than your alien sex slave, Non-Canon Relationship, Non-Canon Storyline, Psychic Abilities, Psychic Bond, Psychic Sex, Real People in Anime Situations, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-21
Updated: 2015-06-21
Packaged: 2018-09-13 16:04:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 40,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9131608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ryk_Oakwine/pseuds/Ryk_Oakwine
Summary: Not all Ashikabi are young men with blank slate lives like Sahashi Minato. Some have families, careers, friends, relationships. For most, the Sekirei Plan is a disaster that wrecks the lives of Ashikabi and Sekirei alike. This is the story of Sekirei 37, Madoka and all the others who weren't the special privileged favorites of the Gods and the Canon Author.





	1. NGFOM 4.1 - Your New Life

**No Game For Old Men**

Book 4.1 – Ch10 Your New Life

_Bonus Material: As usual, there are images from Book 4 (Chapters 10, 11, and 12) that can be found[here](http://oakwinefanfic.tumblr.com/post/122117792314/no-game-for-old-men-book-4).  As always the bonus material is a bit spoilery for the content of Book 4 so you might want to read Book 4 before perusing the images._

_FYI, the_ _images from Book Four are NSFW so only visit if you are of age. Frankly, if you aren't of age you shouldn't be reading Rated M (Rated R movie equivalent) fanfic in the first place._

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

{ _Farsense or other Metafaculties_ }  
[ _Memories_ ]  
" _Internal dialogue_."

Sunday, January 26, 2020  
Ebisu district, Shibuya Ward, Shin Tokyo

Gregory blearily opened his eyes; sleep dragged at his consciousness, reluctant to let go, in spite of his body _screaming_ at him to wake up. Lying on his back in the middle of the large bed that took up part of a wall in the safe house loft, he tried to judge what time it was by the light streaming through the windows. After noon, at least.

Not really surprising that it was so late, considering that he didn't get to sleep until almost dawn.

" _Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, that feels good_ ," he thought.

Gregory lifted his head from his pillow and looked down his body. "Good morning, Mado-chan."

"Mmmm, mmmgah."

Gregory's head fell back against the pillow with a big smile on his face.

" _I'm going to have to start taking my vitamins!"_

o.0.O.0.o

Gregory looked around the loft as he stumbled to the kitchen. Take-out containers and empty drink cans littered the counters, as well as the loft's coffee table, end tables, and the bed stands on either side of the bed.

Leaning against the island counter, Gregory picked up his "safe" cell phone, realizing his regular cell phone was at the family apartment. He stared blankly at the phone for a moment, the slow realization percolating through his fogged mind that he could not safely make the phone call he needed to make using this phone; he needed his regular phone.

" _Can't call a compromised number from this phone. Okay, so a quick trip to the apartment, make the call, then back here. No big deal. An hour, tops_."

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the refrigerator door opening, the appliance's internal light lighting the dim kitchen space of the loft. Dim, because sunset was a few hours past, Gregory realized.

He looked over to where his Sekirei, 37 Madoka, stood in front of the open 'fridge, looking for something. Wearing only an extremely brief thong, striped socks, and a long sleeved t-shirt, she looked good enough to eat as far as Gregory was concerned.

Gregory wasn't sure what the karma bill was going to be for his getting to have that, but he knew it was going to be huge, and it was going to be painful. Which was fine, as long as it was far enough in the future that it didn't interfere with tonight.

"Do we have any whipped cream, Greg?"

Gregory blinked at her, then quickly dialed the unsafe number from memory. When the other line answered, he immediately spoke in his clear, concise, Japanese, "Azama Yo, please."

While Gregory waited for his boss to come to the phone, he snapped a photo with the safe-phone camera before Madoka leaned over and pulled a container of Cool-Whip out of the refrigerator. He also made damn sure the photo didn't accidentally somehow get texted to his boss since he was on the phone with the man. _"That would be about my luck,"_ Gregory thought.

He watched intently as Madoka the slowly sauntered back towards the bed with a sultry smile on her slightly puffy lips.

He had never seen anything as sexy as that smile before.

Gregory's boss answered the line, "Hello? Azama Yo speaking."

"Yo-san, it is O'Donnell Gregory. I sincerely apologize for the late notice but I must take tomorrow off, a sick day, please. Yes. Yes, I am terribly sorry for the inconvenience. No, just a cold, the winter weather. Thank you, I will."

Gregory clicked the phone off and dropped it on the counter, ignoring it as it slid off the counter and clattered to the floor.

He _ran_ back to the bed where Madoka was waiting for him.

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

Wednesday, 29 January, 2020

Wednesday afternoon after school, Gregory walked up the stairs of the safe house loft and looked around for Madoka. Spotting her in the kitchen he called out, "Mado-chan! Please come give me a hand carrying some boxes from the Jeep. I parked it at that pay lot a few blocks away, but there's more than I can carry in one trip."

He dropped an armful of bags onto the kitchen's breakfast bar and received a "welcome home" hug and kiss from his Sekirei. She was wearing some sort of coverall, of a sort that the sides were open all the way down to the waist, the back was just a strip of cloth barely six-inches wide, and the legs were non-existent. It was amazingly distracting and calling it a "coverall" was an ironic joke. An amazingly _hot_ ironic joke.

"I missed you today, Gregory-kun!"

"I missed you too, Mado-chan! Come on; let's get this stuff out of the Jeep. Need to put on sweatpants or something?"

"It is not far, I will just wear my jacket. My legs do not really get very cold. What did you buy today?" Madoka pulled on her pink jacket to cover her very exposed torso as she followed him down the stairs. The two of them slipped on their shoes at the bottom of the stairwell and continued into the garage.

Gregory waited for her to clear the garage-door and join him on the sidewalk before pushing the button that lowered the door again. He answered, "Bunch of computer stuff. Can't safely bring my old main system here because I have no idea how much MBI may have messed with it, so I picked up enough parts to build three new systems from scratch for us here at the loft, courtesy of MBI's Platinum Card. One for you, one for me, and enough parts to build a third for a media server. Computer desks will be delivered to the storage rental since I didn't want them delivered to this address. We'll get some guys to help carry them here; it's always easy enough to find help if you have enough yen."

Madoka took Gregory's hand and held it as they walked along the sidewalk towards the small pay parking lot where he had parked the Jeep. "True, though I thought that those guys who you hired to get the new refrigerator up the stairs were going to kill themselves. I was sure you would have to offer them more money, Gregory-kun."

He grinned, "Not with you there wearing that tight tank-top that day. Those guys were more than willing to risk hernias and heart attacks just to prove to you how strong they were."

Gregory and Madoka succeeded in carrying all the rest of his purchases back to the loft in one trip though it was a close thing. Enough hardware to build three computers plus monitors, keyboards, an air-mouse for each as well as a conventional mouse, and many other accessories, it made for a lot of packages.

The rest of the evening was spent unpacking and organizing the components, then beginning assembly. Madoka absorbed instructions from Gregory quickly; he noticed he rarely had to repeat anything he ever told her.

" _Find a decent IQ test that doesn't require a professional psychologist to administer_ ," he told himself. He was beginning to suspect Madoka's intelligence was at the same end of the bell curve as her looks and her physical fitness were and if that was the case he had to wonder if that were common for all the Sekirei. He could not imagine why it wouldn't be, if they actually were engineered by the "Kouten" for some long term colonization program.

Or they could just be really gifted Terran humans. He was still _very much_ on the fence as far as the whole "we are aliens" thing was concerned.

Madoka did not _act_ like a "smart person", but Gregory knew that had little to do with how efficiently and effectively her brain functioned. _Intellectual curiosity_ was a separate trait from sheer brainpower and how "smart" someone seemed to observers had a lot to do with how interested the subject was in learning new things _and_ how motivated the subject was to demonstrate that knowledge. Madoka found monotonous, detail oriented, tasks, such as the research tests they did with her Farsense metafaculty recently, very tedious and wasn't particularly interested in discovering new things just for the sake of learning new things, but that wasn't a function of intelligence.

Then again, Gregory found the persnickety note taking of details and tests that they had done with her Farsense boring as well (except for how amazing and exciting it was that he had absolute demonstrable _proof_ of frigging _clairvoyance_!). But yes, most of that day had been spent on "Okay, five feet further, can you see the face of the playing card I'm holding up now? And how about five more feet, can you see this playing card? How about the playing card in this box, can you see it? Can you see it in this box and around this corner?"

No, basic observational science was not always exciting. In fact, it was very often tedious and boring. But it _had_ to be done, otherwise neither he nor she would know what to count on with her metafaculties. Nor would they know if those metafaculties improved over time if they didn't have a baseline for their function now.

"So, what brought this on, Gregory-kun? Did you miss your computer so badly?"

Gregory looked up from snapping a video card into the slot on the motherboard of the computer he was assembling and he grinned over at Madoka, who was fastening the other machines motherboard to the case. "No, not particularly, as there's been more than a bit to keep me occupied while here."

That got a smile from her, which distracted him almost as badly as the barely there top of the "coverall" she was wearing. He continued, "I'd like to have all of the music and movies from my home file server available here though. And it would give _you_ more to listen to or watch during the days when you're here. Also, both of the cameras are almost full of data, and while it's all backed up to the cloud storage that's still a lot of photos and videos that I've not had a chance to review, process, select the best of, and so forth. A thousand raw photos sitting on a server somewhere is one thing, and a mostly useless thing at that. Compared to fifty outstanding photos cropped and lightened or darkened, put together so you can flip through them on your phone or tablet, and so you can show them off to people. That's something else, something worth having."

Madoka finished fastening the last screw to the mainboard then looked for the video card for that system. While she was looking through the mess of boxes and bags, she asked, "Why would you need to show the photos to anyone?"

Gregory held up the video card she was looking for. After she took it from him, she gave him a quick kiss in thanks and returned to her computer.

He watched her work as he answered, "Well, you might like the photos and want to share them with a friend, or they might be so awesome you just want to share them with everyone. People like sharing photos."

She looked up and narrowed her eyes at him. He held up his hands defensively, "Hey, no, I'm not going to be sharing any of _those_ pictures with anyone unless you give me permission! That's not the kind of pics I meant. The only actually naked pictures I would share would be with your complete permission and besides you can't post that sort of pictures to most websites anyway. But there _are_ a lot of technically-clothed-and-decent photos of you that I've taken that are still incredibly sexy that I'd like to get processed."

She pursed her lips as if she was considering whether to believe him or not. Madoka returned to her project, replying, "Well, okay. But I do get final say on any naughty pictures before they get shown to anyone! Or I will have to hide your cameras when we are in bed."

Gregory grinned widely, having now forgotten about assembling his own computer, distracted by watching her work on her own. Really, mostly being distracted the way the very thin material of the "coveralls" top she was wearing looked as her breasts moved about under it.

She continued working on assembling her computer, seemingly unaware of his intense gaze. "Did you have some specific plan for the best of the photos you have taken, Gregory-kun?"

He answered, "Yes, actually. I was thinking we need to step up our efforts to reach out to other Ashikabi and Sekirei, especially any who are in this part of town. Remember the social media pages for Ashikabi?"

Madoka nodded, "Yes, and I check it every day since _you_ have forgotten about doing so recently. I do not know if I like my user name being 'Sanjunana' though. That is so boring."

Gregory shrugged, "Maybe so, but I had to come up with something and using our full names didn't seem wise."

She grinned and looked up at him. "I like your user name; '37sAshikabi' means you are mine!"

"And very glad to be yours, my dear Sanjunana." Gregory leaned over the computer parts and kissed Madoka lightly. "So, that was a month and a half ago when I set up all that social media and those pages have just been sitting there, getting several hits a week, probably from new Ashikabi. We only have a few vaguely worded helpful suggestions for other Ashikabi to read and nothing to inspire them to reach out to communicate with us, which was the entire point. I figured most new Ashikabi are going to head straight to Google or Yahoo as soon as Minaka finishes his insane introduction, since those are the most popular search sites in Japan, by far."

Madoka nodded. "The Ashikabi probably will, though my sister Sekirei would not know to do so. It still astounds me how little I knew about life before I was released into the city. I had never heard of Wikipedia, or even Google. I do not know for sure about the Sekirei raised outside of Group 11, but if Group 11 was typical at all we can bet the Sekirei will not know anything about how to find information."

"There is that," Gregory agreed. "So, reaching the Ashikabi is essential. Once they search the most obvious terms they should find the Sekirei and Ashikabi Google+ group or one of the many other social media pages that auto feed from the Google+ group, like our Twitter, Global Homie, Facebook, Mixi, Ameba, several other services. Google+ is the most popular social media service in Japan these days so I used that as our primary service. That, and I can't stand Global Homie's interface. It's like that service was designed for low functioning ADHD thirteen year olds. Ugh. Anyway, on the Google+ page, in addition to posting some general info we've discovered about MBI and the Sekirei Plan, nothing that should get us in trouble with MBI, just more than _we_ started with, I also put together a series of photo albums for Sekirei and their Ashikabi. And since you and I are the only Sekirei and Ashikabi we know of so far you and I are the subjects of the one album that is up there now. Mostly you. All you, actually. No one in their right mind wants to see a photo of me if it means one less photo of you, I assure you. So, I figure fifty of the best photos I've taken over the last two months?"

She gave him a flat look at his self-deprecation before she started attaching power cables to the internal peripherals of her computer. She then asked, "Do you think it is safe? Letting them know who we are? Or that I am one of the already released Sekirei and such?"

Gregory continued watching Madoka intently work on assembling the computer, admiring how beautiful she was with that look of concentration on her face. "Well, Mado-chan, I think it is. At least, it's probably worth the risk. Supposedly, the First Phase is about finding your Ashikabi, and MBI was very clear they wanted to keep the Sekirei and the Sekirei Plan completely hidden at this point. So fighting in the streets and such as you've seen from Higa's people isn't supposed to be going on yet, that's got to be what the Second Phase is about. But yes, a _ny_ communication with other Ashikabi and Sekirei is going to be a security risk, but compare that risk to the sure danger of hiding in a hole for the next few months until MBI tracks us down and pulls us out of our hole and throws us at whoever the last standing Sekirei is, to be finished off."

That got Madoka to look up at him, with a grimace on her flawless face. "That is not a very nice picture, Gregory-kun."

"I know," he answered. "But at a certain point that's what we can expect to happen. So, hiding won't work, running won't work for reasons we already discussed, so our best bet is going outside of MBI's narrow Plan. We'll reach out to the other Ashikabi especially, because hardly any of them are going to be excited about 'Fight, Fight, Fight, until only one is left', I guarantee it. And while there's going to be some who get excited about the chance of winning some super prize, and others who will be led around by their cocks by their Sekirei and so participate in the Sekirei Plan, there's going to be a lot more who want nothing to do with it if alternatives are offered."

"Yes, our strategy, as you mentioned that Sunday afternoon when we were at the Four Seasons," Madoka said.

Gregory blinked at the oddly specific reference, remembering now that yes, their first discussion about strategy and tactics _had_ been on that Sunday afternoon exactly one month ago today, after Karen had left and his breakdown at the apartment. He and Madoka had spent the rest of that weekend at the Four Seasons Marunouchi, their first five-star hotel weekend courtesy of MBI. He recalled that he and Madoka had kissed that afternoon, at that hotel, deliberately and with purpose, for the first time (outside of the kiss that bonded them, that night in the Jeep). _"I'll bet that kiss in the hotel room is why she remembers the day so specifically,"_ he thought. Women were strange creatures, and Sekirei women stranger yet, with priorities and concerns very different from men and likely never to be fully understood by Gregory O'Donnell.

Madoka was now finished with attaching all of the power cables to the various internal devices inside the computer case and had begun running the shielded fiber optic lines from the motherboard to the pair of solid-state drives which would be the primary active data storage for the system. She had also run the secondary fiber optic lines from the motherboard to the new Molecular Memory Data Store, which was a colossal 10-petabyte state-of-the-art data storage "drive" of a sort that he had never been able to justify the expense for his old server. Now though, that fucking lunatic Hiroto Minaka and MBI was glad to provide!

She continued, interrupting his mental woolgathering, "And we will offer them those alternatives, Gregory-kun? How will we convince them?"

"Well, Mado-chan, it would depend on who they are and what they are like. At least emailing or texting would be a good start, though if we text any of them we have to mark the phone we use as immediately compromised, so don't let me forget that, okay? One angle I've thought of would be to offer them a friendly service like taking portraits of their newfound beautiful companion. It would be a kind of icebreaker. The Ashikabi and Sekirei will already be looking at the Google+ page, or one of the other social media services that will be mirroring the Google+ page's content. So they'll see our photo album, featuring the very best of the photos I've taken of my beautiful Mado-chan, nothing indecent of course, but gorgeous and sexy pics. All selected or edited to not show clear locations around here, just in case."

Madoka agreed with that precaution. "We will have to assume the Ashikabi are at least as knowledgeable as you are about how to use resources to look up locations, even from information in the background of a picture or from the… metadata, that is what it is called, right?"

Gregory nodded, certain that Madoka remembered exactly what metadata was from their previous discussions about his photography hobby. He marked her questioning tone as another quirk, evolved to reduce the appearance of having a perfect memory for details. Gregory had already concluded that being too smart was no more a desirable trait among Sekirei than it was among typical teenage girls. That mentality existed even here in Japan, though it was not nearly as bad here as it was in the States.

He affirmed what she had said, "Yes, metadata. I've got a macro programmed in Photoshop now that strips all of the metadata out of every photo I process, automatically, so that I don't accidentally forget and post the exact GPS coordinates of our loft here."

"That would suck, Gregory-kun. It is good that will not happen."

He grinned, "Yes, it is good that will not happen. And yes, I am assuming all the other Ashikabi are at least as information systems competent as I am. Many will be far more adept at using social media, computers, internet resources, as well as portable computing devices like phones and tablets. Just like Mishi knew far more than I know, even still, about the capabilities of the phones we carry around."

Gregory reached over to the coffee table where his Diet Coke was. After taking a sip he continued, "Anyway, the Ashikabi will be flipping through the albums because you are absolutely delicious," and that got him another smile from his pretty Sekirei, "and the Sekirei will be watching over the Ashikabi's shoulder because their Ashikabi just shouted 'hey, look, there's stuff about the Sekirei Plan here on Global Homie!' Hopefully that Sekirei will be thinking they want beautiful pictures of themselves and their Ashikabi too, why should Number 37 have all the fun?"

Madoka had stopped her own work to listen to and consider what Gregory was saying. "That is… actually very clever, Gregory-kun. Maybe more clever than you realize; almost all my sisters are vain enough to find it very appealing. Not just appealing but as soon as they see the kind of photos you have made of me and of us they will be burning with jealousy that they too do not have such an album. And if we get even one more Sekirei and Ashikabi album of portraits posted then it will snowball; truly most of my sisters cannot stand the idea someone may one up them in the realm of visible tributes to their beauty. There were only two Sekirei in Group 11 I can think of who would not immediately push to be included in the posted albums, and one is 86 Katsuragi. The other is 16 Toyotama's best friend, 18 Ichiya. The rest were very competitive in who was most beautiful."

Gregory chuckled, shaking his head. "I really can't imagine what life was like in such a cloistered environment, surrounded by twitchy ego-centric adolescent powerhouses, Mado-chan."

She grimaced, "It was difficult, if you weren't at the top of the Badass Scale. And even more difficult if you combined low Badass scores with high attractiveness scores."

Gregory's expression turned somber at the picture his Sekirei was painting. It sounded more like a women's hard-time penitentiary than a dormitory. "I'm sure it was, Mado-chan. Just another thing MBI, Minaka Hiroto, and anyone else responsible for what happened and is happening to the Sekirei will answer for. So, who came up with the term 'Badass Scale', that doesn't sound like official MBI terminology?"

Madoka gave him a small smile of appreciation for his understanding. "Oh, Yosuga started that, years ago. It was not a real thing, but the name caught on among the Group 11 Sekirei. There were many arguments about who was at the top of the Badass Scale. Not so many about who was at the bottom of it. That was always me." She grimaced at the memory then continued, "So, Gregory-kun, then it is just a matter of convincing the Sekirei that this is not a trap to catch them unaware and ambush them."

"Yeah, that's something that will take some convincing, Mado-chan. Still, it will be worth the effort I think. And maybe we can work up some good will among our fellow couples this way. Not only does a person feel gratitude towards a photographer that is able to produce pictures that make them look good, but in my experience if you can capture a picture of a couple that shows how much they care about each other, they often feel the photographer understands them. It establishes a bit of a trusting connection. It's what I like doing, so why not try to use it? Besides, just getting in touch with the others, even if we don't meet in person, is a good thing."

Madoka stood and smiled at him then nodded, making parts of her jiggle happily under her clothes. "I like it, Gregory-kun! And you should show me how to use the cameras too, so I can help!"

"Good idea, Mado-chan. For now though, stay right there while I grab my Nikon. The light coming through that window behind you is perfect and I can't resist the picture of you in that sinful excuse for an outfit."

_That_ got another smile from his amazingly sexy Sekirei. They didn't get any more work done on building computers that night.

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

" _It sure would be great if my Sekirei loved country music. I sure wish Madoka liked Mickey Gilley's music. I'd love to have a Sekirei who thinks Barbara Mandrell is the best singer ever…"_

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

Saturday, 1 February, 2020

The next weekend they celebrated a week since becoming lovers by not leaving their bed unless absolutely necessary.

Madoka was glad the walls of the loft were concrete and notably sound proof. She'd discovered that Gregory appreciated the sound of her voice in bed, whether moaning in his ear or screaming in pleasure, so she made no effort to restrain herself.

Embarrassment for that sort of thing was another of those "not helpful" tendencies she was working on rooting out.

"Yes, OH fuck yes! Harder! Yes, Greg! So close, faster, do not stop, do not stop…"

"Ah, ah, oh, OW FUCK, ow, ow, fuck, hold on, Mado, wait…"

Madoka was now gritting her own teeth against the stabbing pain she too felt from a sudden tear in a muscle in his-her left thigh.

Last week, after their long talk and Gregory agreeing to being her lover as well as her Ashikabi, the first time he had entered her she had made a remarkable discovery; she could experience _everything_ he felt in their lovemaking now, not just his orgasm and the fantasy in his mind at the moment of climax. This was normally a completely wonderful thing, but…

If there was a downside to her sharing Gregory's perceptions, it was that she shared _all_ of them, including the bad ones. Usually it was helpful, like knowing when he was pushed to the limit of his endurance and was getting too winded to keep up the wild pace she enjoyed. She'd learned that it didn't do any good to push him to the point where he had to spend a half hour cooling off and catching his breath. Currently he was breathing hard, just as she was, but she knew he still had stamina left, but… it was too late now.

She tried to keep frustration out of her voice, "What is it, Gregory-kun?" Trying, and failing. _"Damnit, so close!"_

"Ow, damn. Hold on, Mado-chan, let me sit up… here, thigh muscle, left leg, here on the outside."

Madoka sighed, feeling Gregory lose his erection quickly due to the pain he was in. She knew exactly where it hurt, though she was careful to avoid him noticing that fact. Sadly, this was not the first time this had happened in the last week; there had been a half dozen other sprains and tears in Gregory's somewhat out of shape muscles and tendons. She was able to ignore his embarrassment that trickled over the connection easier than she could ignore the actual pain she still felt in her own hip. Maybe she could use the embarrassment he felt over being so out of shape to inspire him to put effort into getting into shape? And surely there was some way she could use her healing Redaction to fix up her Ashikabi's less-than-athletic body.

Something to add to her Reading List.

They untangled and Gregory sat up on the side of the bed, taking this opportunity to reach over to his nightstand and pick up the bottle of water he kept there. While he opened the cap and took a long drink of water, she placed her hand against Gregory's left thigh, up by the hip, and focused her attention on the muscles under the skin. Her hand gave off a soft, green, glow as she pressed it against the injured leg.

She murmured, "Here?" At Gregory's agreeing grunt, she continued, "Okay, I am going to try the Healing Probe, since I've got my Norito Boost, Ashikabi-kun. Wish me luck."

Gregory wiped his mouth then closed the cap on the water bottle and nodded. "Remember, try to feel your Farsense metafunction before you pull up your Redaction or you'll just flood the spot with general healing."

Madoka concentrated on her Farsense metafunction, wanting to "see" the injury in her Ashikabi's hip, then pulled her Redaction metafunction up to mix them together. At first, she could see the skin of Gregory's thigh and hip in perfect magnified high resolution, the tiny sweat pores and the fine hairs scattered around on the pale skin… but then…

_{Redact-Farsense Healing Probe}_

_To Madoka's perception she was abruptly "disembodied"; she was now only a point-of-view without the physical tools of her eyes. She was_ _inside_ _Gregory's leg, able to see the layers of skin, then the muscles, the blood vessels, strings of nerve bundles, deeper still she could see the dense bone of Gregory's femur, the ball and socket joint at the hip, and the large curved bone of his hip. She knew there was no light inside the leg to illuminate what she was seeing but she also knew she was not using her eyes to see anyway._

_It was_ _strange_ _._

_She focused her attention on her Redaction, letting it lead her to where the injury was. Right away she found herself looking at a tear in the dense ligament tissue at the bottom end of the… what was that muscle called… Madoka searched her memory but could not recall. She chided herself that she really should spend more time studying anatomy._

_Whatever it was called, the wide band of muscle that connected the top of the iliac crest of the hipbones then down the outside of the hip where it then connected to a large, long, bunch of hard ligaments that stretched all the way to the outside of the knee. The tear was at the point that the wide, red, muscle connected to that long mass of ligament; it was separated from the muscle at points and strained at other points. It looked very painful._

_Now that she had found the injury, Madoka went to repairing it. She had no hands to touch or to hold things here, but the intent to do so resulted in a similar sensation. She felt the muscle and the ligament in her grip, and then she held them together and pushed her Redaction power into the tissues, willing them to reattach and repair. She watched as the tissues did exactly that. It was a shame she could only do this when she was boosted by Norito. When she tried to do this sort of healing in her normal state it never worked._

_A few moments of "looking" around the immediate area to make sure there were no other weak points in the complex web of muscles, ligaments, and tendons, that made up the hip and thigh, then Madoka relaxed her Farsight and withdrew her awareness from Gregory's leg._

_{End Healing Probe}_

Madoka massaged the now-healed muscles, knowing how much Gregory enjoyed the feel of her hands on any part of his body. "I cannot believe I never learned to do such things while still in the MBI Sekirei Labs, but I guess if it only works when I am in my Norito Boost State I could not learn it before meeting you. So, Gregory-kun, among other new experiences, I am getting _much_ practice with using my Redaction to heal pulled muscles and torn ligaments. And practice with the Healing Probe, it worked first try that time! I found the tear almost immediately and I could tell that repairing it took only a fraction of the energy that it would have taken with my old method of just pouring healing energy into the area. So that is good, right? Is it better now?"

Gregory scowled at her teasing words and grumbled, "Yes, it is, and thank you Mado-chan. And sure, laugh it up. I know you're getting lots of chances to patch sprains and tears in my humble old body. You'll be old and decrepit someday and then you'll feel bad for wrecking your poor Ashikabi's body with your insatiable appetites. Minx."

She just laughed in response, "Is that a complaint, Gregory-kun?" Madoka looked up at her Ashikabi's dimly lit face, the slight creases and lines stark and rugged in the shadowy illumination of the nighttime loft. She kissed a trail along his thigh and up towards his hip as her hand moved to take hold of his flaccid penis. No, not penis. It was his cock! That was their agreed upon term, she reminded herself!

"Huh, complaint? You know better than that, sweetheart." Gregory reached over to the nightstand on his side of the bed and set down the now-half-empty bottle of water. "So, where were we?"

Her hand wrapped around its target and quickly restored his flagging spirits. "Well, Ashikabi-kun, it does not matter where we were; we have to start all over now!"

The two naked lovers moved back onto the large bed, scooting up to where the pillows were, below two of the ceiling-high windows that looked out over the back street below their loft.

In response to her insistence that they had to start over, Gregory quoted, "O, woe is me, to see what I have seen, see what I see!"

Madoka could not help but snort then laugh at Gregory's whimsical remark.

He raised an eyebrow while leaning back against the headboard of the bed. "It wasn't that funny, was it? Shakespeare, the comic, from Hamlet?"

"Hmmm. It was funny, but if I explain why it will make you all self-conscious and interfere with my fun, my Ashikabi." Madoka distracted him from the subject of anyone seeing what his eyes saw, woefully or not, by stroking his cock with one hand while raking her fingernails lightly along the bare skin of his upper thighs. She smiled her best smile up at him while rubbing the sensitive head of his cock against her cheek, one side, then the other.

She let herself sink into the split perception that she now associated with their lovemaking; feeling and seeing everything he perceived as well as everything her own body experienced. She felt his/her pulse race, sensed how he/she loved seeing his cock and her face together. She made a point to remember to do this again, because what it felt like, looking down at _that girl's_ face, her fingers wrapped around the long shaft of his cock, rubbing the head of it across her lips… it was so, _so_ , arousing!

She closed her own eyes and focused on Gregory's view completely, murmuring, "For now, just do please keep your eyes open and watch me do this, please, Gregory-kun?"

"Ahhh. Yes, okay Mado. Anything you want. Just keep doing that and, ahh… Jesus, Mary and Joseph that's good…"

Madoka was _highly_ motivated to learn how to do all the things Gregory had fantasized about during his "private time" in the shower over the last month. She had been surprised, their first time together, that sex with Gregory was not _all_ like the intense, overwhelming, lust he felt at the point of orgasm, with which she had become so familiar. He was actually a tender and considerate lover. And, she was not particularly surprised to learn, doing the things he fantasized about was not easy or instinctive; there were actual techniques and skills that went along with some of those fantasies. Techniques and skills she _needed_ to learn now! Like learning how to deep throat his cock without choking or gagging. So far, she had not managed more than half its 18-centimeter length so she was obviously going to have to do some reading on the subject.

For now, though, she would focus on how incredible it felt, and looked, to have at least half of it eagerly and energetically sucked by the most beautiful girl she had ever seen.

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

"Mister Gregory?"

"Yes, Mister Tomoya?

Thursday, February 6th. Senior English. Third period. Gregory listened to the question from his student then stood and illustrated the answer on the whiteboard. Gregory then returned to sit at the teacher's desk, forcing himself to keep his personal tablet in his briefcase and only work on the school tablet, since it did not have the distractions on it that his personal storage had.

Glancing at the clock above the classroom door he noted the time was 10:57 a.m.

In the almost-two weeks since his life had changed thanks to Madoka, two weeks since he was convinced to help himself to the most addictive drug he could imagine, Madoka's body. Now Gregory found that the time he spent in class was miserable. He'd come to dislike every minute that kept him away from his Sekirei. He resented every sound he heard that wasn't her clear mezzo-soprano voice crying out in pleasure or whispering endearments in his ear.

" _I love you, Gregory-kun_."

He could live a hundred years and hear those words a hundred times every day and he would still want to hear them again.

A year from now would he be glad he kept his job instead of spending every minute he could with his Sekirei?

Why was he wasting his time here instead of being with her?

" _Ah, yes! There, oh, yes, there, oh, yes yes, fuck me, oh god! Yes, oh fuck me Greg!"_

He rested his head in his hands, his elbows propped up on the teacher's desk. Gregory closed his eyes and he tried, desperately, to clear his head and slow his heart. " _Get a hold of yourself, man! Calm, calm, breathe slowly, in, out. Don't think about her._ "

Don't think about the way her skin felt under his hands, so soft and smooth. Or how the taste of her was ambrosia, unearthly and delicious. How her blue eyes would _shine_ in the dimly lit loft when she looked up at him, her hand gently cupping his cheek as he slowly worked himself in and out of her hot, tight, body.

" _Greg, please look me in the eyes when you cum. Ah, ah, do not close your eyes, oh, yes… oh, yes, oh, oh, god!"_

Her wings flaring, repeatedly over the weekend, which surprised them a few times. They both laughed until their abdomen muscles ached when they'd been startled by confirmation that semen was just as effective an activator for Sekirei wings as saliva was.

He glanced up at the clock. 11 a.m.

" _I love you, Greg."_

"Mister Gregory?"

" _Like this, Gregory-kun?"_

Her pleased expression when he mentioned that the Sekirei Crest between her shoulders was a little darker pink now than it was right after her winging.

"Mister Gregory?"

11:02 a.m.

" _My Ashikabi, I will love you forever and ever."_

"Mister Gregory, are you okay, sir?"

Gregory shook his head, "Yes, I'm sorry, Miss Kyou. What was your question?"

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

Madoka walked out of the linen store and headed back towards the loft. She was carrying a cloth tote bag with a handle in each hand, both full of western-style bed sheets. The two sets they had purchased with the bed were not going to be enough, unless she wanted to do laundry every other day.

She and Gregory had spent every night together, at the safe house loft, since he had finally given in and made love to her. It was amazingly fun, but now she was not sure how safe it was; if MBI was tracking Gregory's original cell phone then it showed him just staying at the O'Donnell apartment all the last almost-two-weeks instead of going back and forth to school as was usual. However, neither she nor Gregory was willing to give up their time together to spend hours going back and forth from the safe house to the O'Donnell apartment every evening and morning.

And Gregory was adamant about the two of them not having sex in the O'Donnell apartment, so staying there was out of the question as far as Madoka was concerned. There was no way she was giving up her nightly fun, watching from Gregory's eyes and feeling with Gregory's body what it was like making love to _that girl_.

Spending all of the time at the safe house loft was problematic though. This morning it was a close thing for Gregory even getting out the door to get to school on time. As far as Madoka was concerned Gregory should quit his job so that they could spend all of their time together, the MBI Card certainly provided for them. But his career was important to Gregory and something he'd worked on for years, so she did her best to accept his need to be at the school.

As Madoka walked, she realized the vague sense of anxiety she had been experiencing for the last hour was actually coming to her through her bond with Gregory. It was usually difficult for her to sense more than the direction he was in if they were separated by more than a handful of meters. But there was definitely a feeling of distress coming from him today.

She tried to send reassurance over their bond, " _Only one more day till the weekend; it will be okay."_

This morning it was cool and clear in Shin Tokyo, so Madoka was comfortable in green cargo pants, a snug, pink, long sleeved t-shirt, and tennis shoes. And her new wireless earbuds that played music from her phone, too! She had purchased those and the same kind of wireless mic that Gregory used, the kind that was tiny and stuck to your cheek. The one she purchased for herself was shaped like Hello Kitty, unlike Gregory's.

Her outfit had been chosen for walking comfort since she was afoot on her to-do list trips today. She had considered taking her bicycle on her shopping rounds but she had to be honest with herself and admit that she was still a bit sore to be bicycling. Using her healing abilities on herself never worked as well as on others and after almost two weeks of taking every opportunity they could to have sex, well, walking was not so bad whereas her bicycle seat was very… intrusive and unforgiving.

She had already visited the local post office to withdraw the daily limit on cash from her MBI card. She had stashed the ¥500,000 from the ATM in the bottom of the knapsack that she wore, done her linen shopping, and picked up some drinks from the corner store. So now, it was back to the loft where she really needed to do some housekeeping.

Gregory led the charge last Tuesday evening in cleaning up all the take-out boxes and soda cans that were littering the loft. He had grumbled that he'd wanted to coming home Tuesday and take her to bed immediately but instead the loft was still a mess from the weekend. He wasn't critical of _her_ about it, not directly, but Madoka couldn't help but feel maybe she _could_ have spent the day doing something productive instead of lounging around.

What surprised her was that the idea of doing housework did not bother her, at all. Maybe it was because Gregory didn't pretend cleaning was "woman's work"? He was more than glad to do the same work; he grumbled because he had been at his job all day and instead of being able to enjoy time together that evening, they had to spend that time cleaning up the mess. She _had_ spent Tuesday lounging in bed, when she _could_ have cleaned up so they could have more time together doing more fun things.

She wasn't sure why her usual desire to avoid doing things like dishes or sweeping and mopping was absent. In fact, she felt that taking care of the place they built to be together was something she _wanted_ to do now.

As she crossed the busy crosswalk for Meiji Dori street, Madoka noticed that a plump, middle-aged, salaryman in a rumpled suit had been trying to be subtle about watching her breasts bounce as she walked past him. As well they might bounce, since she had decided some days ago to forgo wearing a bra ever again unless absolutely necessary.

" _Tits, Madoka, you agreed to calling them tits, not breasts. Gregory finally gave in and agreed to the term 'pussy', so we agreed to call them 'tits'. So think tits, not breasts."_

Mishi would be scandalized at Madoka's braless state, Madoka was sure, and how ironic was that? But _one look_ through Gregory's perceptions at what her braless, hard-nippled, t-shirt-covered tits looked like and she had been utterly convinced that bras were a tool of evil and repression, never to be suffered again.

So, before she got too far ahead of the ogling salaryman, Madoka put on her best smile, spun around and walked backwards for a few steps, and deliberately putting a bit more "bounce" in her stride.

When the salaryman's eyes guiltily jumped upwards from where they had been watching her ass, Madoka gave him a cheeky wink and then turned back around, continuing along her walk back towards the loft with a broad smile on her face.

Madoka thought about how just a month ago she would have been horrified at even the suggestion of flaunting herself at some overweight man in his 50's. That was before she learned, first hand and in full sensory intimacy, what she looked like through a man's eyes. Before she learned what men felt when they looked at her.

Now she couldn't _help_ but share a little of what cost her nothing. Share some of what was given to her for free but had more value than gold and diamonds.

The last two weeks, seeing herself through Gregory's eyes throughout their lovemaking, had dramatically affected the way she saw herself. Madoka was addicted to _that girl_ ; addicted to what _that girl_ did to Gregory-Madoka, what _she_ looked like and felt like and tasted like. More addicted to it than Gregory was.

She had still not told him about the way she had been piggybacking on his orgasms during the month before they started sleeping together, when he would masturbate. Nor had she told him how she now experienced everything he experienced, when they had sex. She knew she should tell him, but the moment just hadn't seemed right.

Madoka slowed her pace, frowning in concentration. She thought she sensed someone nearby, another Sekirei. She stopped and stood with her back to the display window of a furniture store and closed her eyes, concentrating her Farsense. Yes, there was an unwinged Sekirei nearby. Whoever she was, she was about 200 meters away and up, probably on a rooftop. Opening her eyes, Madoka looked around and spotted a clothing store she had not seen the last time she walked this way down the Meiji Dori street. It was off to the left and the loft was to the right, but she figured she had time for a little detour and it fit the tactics she and Gregory had decided on for what to do if she noticed another Sekirei while she was out running errands.

Step 1: Get off the street and into a store, somewhere out of line-of-sight for someone atop the roofs of the ubiquitous tall buildings in western Tokyo or someone on the sidewalks or the streets.

Addendum to Step 1: Don't worry about getting cornered in a store; they all have back doors that you can push your way through if you must.

Step 2: Use Farsense to gather as much information about the other Sekirei as possible.

Addendum to Step 2: Keep up a running verbal commentary on what you are sensing; the phones are recording everything at all times so having that to work from later will be invaluable.

Step 3: Wait and see if the other Sekirei came closer or moved away.

Walking into the clothing store she had selected, Madoka quickly picked several tops and jackets off the rack near the front of the store and moved towards the dressing room. Belatedly noticing that the pretty girl at the cash register was watching Madoka carefully, the little blonde Sekirei realized carrying canvas bags around a retail store _was_ probably suspicious. Embarrassed, she approached the counter.

"Would it be okay if I leave these here while I try these on?" Madoka set the tote bags with their expensive Egyptian cotton sheets as well as her knapsack on the counter. _That_ got her a friendly smile and approval for leaving the bags in the care of the clerk, which in turn led to a friendlier demeanor from the other sales staff.

Madoka mused on the social faux pas and on the difficulties caused by being raised in the very limited environment of the MBI Sekirei Labs. _"It is the little things we never consider that make a person stand out. How unprepared all of us are for life in this complex world."_

In the dressing room, Madoka closed her eyes and concentrated her Farsense, searching for the other Sekirei. She also began a sub-vocalized running commentary on everything she was now thinking and everything she was now sensing via her Farsense, so that her phone's cheek mic could pick up the commentary and record it, making it possible for later review.

At first Madoka's point of view was from inside the store. She focused her efforts on moving her "point of view" outside onto the street and closer to the other Sekirei, so the city block of concrete and steel buildings weren't in the way.

There were several multi-story buildings on this side of the street in the direction she sensed the other Sekirei. Her target was likely atop one of them. There, on the roof of a 14-story apartment building that backed against the Shibuya River, just like the safe house loft did.

She was glad that, at Gregory's suggestion, she'd been practicing moving her point-of-view. She could now, within some distinct limits, actually look _around_ corners.

It was not easy though, especially when her point of view was rising away from the street, up at a diagonal towards the Sekirei 200 meters east and 14-stories up. Madoka found it disorienting to seem to be "off the ground", which fact she tried to keep to herself as it vaguely seemed a personal failing, something she should be ashamed of.

She held the focus as long as she could, moving her point-of-view as close to the other Sekirei as possible. Then, holding that position, she "zoomed in" from that point to try to see who it was who'd set off her alarms.

The other Sekirei was definitely unwinged, that was even clearer now. She was very powerful for an unwinged Sekirei though, if Madoka was viewing her correctly. At least twice as powerful as Madoka, easily, and Madoka was a _winged Sekirei_.

Could the other Sekirei be a single number? What did she look like? The building the other Sekirei had chosen was unfortunately the tallest in the immediate area and Madoka could only get a vague image of long blonde hair stirring in the high winds that were common that far above the street, even "zooming in" as much as she could. It was the _angle_ that was the problem; she needed to move her point-of-view higher…

" _Ow!"_ Madoka found her perception harshly returned to the dressing room. _"Okay, I would like to avoid doing that again. That was extremely unpleasant."_ It would seem that losing control of her Farsense, and the resulting deactivation of the metafunction, resulted in some kind of backlash. Painful backlash. She should tell Gregory about that, later.

Gingerly reaching out with the general, unspecific, form of her Farsense that operated as her early warning about other Sekirei, she noted that the unwinged Sekirei who had set off her alarms had moved on, at least far enough away that Madoka could no longer sense her.

Madoka resumed shopping with a smile and a sense of relief. She would need to write down the specifics of this encounter as soon as she got back to the loft, and listening to the audio recording of her subvocalizing her stream-of-consciousness for the last five minutes would help get the details down correctly. For now, she picked out a new cotton chemise which looked thin and likely to present her tits nicely, as well as a few pair of socks, which looked thick and warm.

She paid with her pocket cash, since Gregory had stressed that they needed to avoid using the MBI Card at too many merchants in a detectable pattern around the safe house. If it was a small, local, purchase, use cash.

They certainly had enough of it. Sixteen million yen, at last count of the contents of their safe. The ¥5,000 for socks and a top was hardly worth thinking about.

As she left the store with her new purchases and her tote bags, she fell back to thinking of the salaryman at the crosswalk. She wondered why she had ever thought that a fifty-year-old pudgy man was such a danger that doing anything other than _hiding from his eyes_ was a risk she just _had_ to avoid. Why had she ever been outraged at the idea of a "pervert" looking at her and appreciating what he saw?

Had she worried so much that someone might get the wrong idea? That they might mistake friendly flirtation for an invitation to more? Perhaps. But even if she wasn't able to punch holes in concrete walls like most Sekirei, she really had little to worry about from any individual human male trying to take more than was offered.

Not anymore at least. Not since her winging. And especially not since her encounter with 16 Toyotama and her Ashikabi's analysis of that encounter. She was far more in touch with her abilities now than when she had been newly released from MBI; any human male who laid a hand on her now without her consent would regret it.

She had chosen to let go of the fear she had somehow been infected with by the scientists and administrators at MBI. Now she happily shared a bit of sexy awesomeness with the people around her.

And when she had chosen to walk away from that conditioned fear, she had felt free, truly free, for the first time in her life.

Even though it meant scowls from the women around her.

She figured that they disapproved because they too lived with the same fear she used to live with. It wasn't their fault. They didn't have Sekirei powers, not even the odd powers Madoka had been given, so she forgave them their hostility and their disapproving clucks at the sight of her t-shirt covered, happily bouncing, braless, tits which were so obviously enjoying their freedom and the cool air.

Of course refusing to live in fear did not mean taking security for granted, not with MBI and the Sekirei Plan hanging over their heads. She made sure no one was watching as she punched in the security code for the ground-floor garage door. Once the door had rolled up enough to walk under she stepped into the empty garage under their safe house loft. She made sure the garage door closed behind her and that the steel door leading from the garage to the stairwell locked behind her as well.

At the top of the stairs, Madoka stepped into the space she was coming to love more than any place she had ever known. It was her place with Gregory and that made it precious.

Madoka tossed the new bed linens onto the bed then stripped off her t-shirt and cargo pants, grabbing a cotton camisole from her dresser. She had grown reluctant to wear much clothing in her and Gregory's place. Some clothing, because Gregory liked that. But not much, because Gregory liked that too.

She put the cash from the ATM into their floor safe and spun the combination wheel to lock it, then updated the white-board in the kitchen area with the new balance in the safe: ¥25,300,000

Frankly, the safe was getting too full. She would ask Gregory about alternatives; maybe they could keep some of their emergency cash elsewhere?

Madoka walked to one of the windows that overlooked the "back alley" that ran along one side the rental block. She loved watching the people busily going about their day. The old man with the noodle wagon who passed by every two hours. The wrinkled obaasan who swept the alleyway for ten meters on either side of her small curio shop on and off through the day.

Soon enough Madoka felt the need to get busy on the rest of her to-do list. After stripping the king –sized bed of the rumpled and sweaty sheets from last night and replacing them with the new clean sheets, Madoka set to cleaning the loft. It was a big room but it did not take much clutter for it to start feeling messy.

Today was Thursday, so tomorrow she would have the time to do a good cleaning of the place and go shopping for food to fill the refrigerator before the weekend. A weekend she hoped to spend entirely in bed, being in Gregory's head and seeing what he saw and feeling what he felt as he made love to her over and over again.

There was nothing in the world that was as beautiful as what Gregory saw when he looked into her eyes.

Madoka could not get enough of it.

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

Friday, 7 February 2020

The next morning found Gregory dressed in his work clothes and standing at the island counter in the safe house kitchen. It was 6:30am and he _had_ to leave in the next five minutes or he would be late for work, again.

He had his briefcase, his suit jacket was on, and his tie was tied. His shirt was clean and pressed; Madoka had made sure of that, for him.

He had already had a cup of coffee to try to help wake up. But he was tired, in spite of the coffee. He didn't get to sleep until 2:30am, even though he kept telling himself he needed to sleep. But he couldn't resist Madoka's body just one more time. And then another. He was exhausted now though; he couldn't keep trying to get by on three and four hours of sleep a night.

Gregory stared sightlessly at the far wall of the kitchen, gripping the island countertop so hard that the tendons stood out in stark relief on the back of his hands.

Behind him, four meters away, he could hear Madoka shifting on the bed, stirring the comfortable sheets around her glorious, naked, body.

"Gregory-kun? Are you okay?" Her sleepy voice caressed his ears, making him smile in spite of everything. Her voice always sounded _so_ good to him.

"Gregory-kun?"

And she was naked under those warm, soft, sheets. Her magnificent, utterly fuckable body was just waiting for him to ravage, more than willing, and all for him.

" _Get hold of yourself, man. This is craziness. Come on, get some perspective."_

Gregory continued staring blindly at the darkened wall of the kitchen and thought of a line from Shakespeare he'd never understood before, " _Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety. Other women cloy the appetites they feed, but she makes hungry_ …"

That had always sounded like a line of bullshit that a guy would tell a woman. The kind of thing a woman wanted to hear but no guy ever really meant.

He understood it, now. He'd fed and fed but was still _starving_ for her.

He had already called in just last week, after five years on the job with not calling in sick once. He was late for work yesterday, also very rare for him. His boss had not said anything about his behavior yet, but it was bound to happen, soon. Even as valuable a teacher as Gregory was, he could not get away with more than a week of not taking care of his responsibilities.

Gregory jumped when Madoka's hand touched his back; he had not heard her get out of bed nor had he heard her pad barefooted across the concrete floor to where he was standing. She moved up against his side and looked up at him, the dim light from the kitchen appliances illuminating her face, showing worry and concern.

"What is it, Gregory-kun?"

He turned his face away from her, embarrassed by the tears that suddenly burned in his eyes. Gregory clenched his teeth and tried to keep the knot of pain in his chest from coming out. The effort made his shoulders shake.

He took a deep breath and tried to speak but could not get the words out. He shook his head and tried again.

"I can't do this, Mado. I can't take another day of watching the clock and feeling every second tick away slowly, so damn slowly. It's killing me, it really is." Gregory felt hot tears streaking his cheeks and he cringed at how much of a damn crybaby he seemed to have turned into in the last few weeks.

Madoka managed to wiggle herself in between him and the counter, turning him to face her forcibly. Her brow wrinkled with confusion and her mouth set in a line. "Gregory-kun, I do not understand. Tell me, what do you mean?"

Then he could barely make out Madoka's features as tears filled his eyes again. Gregory shook his head in frustration. For once he could not figure out how to say what he was thinking and feeling. Or maybe he just didn't like how it sounded in his own head so he couldn't make himself say it out loud. He had pointed out to others, like his daughter and even to Madoka, often enough, how they knew what they were feeling or thinking, they just did not like the way it sounded if they said it. It was probably only fitting that he be crucified on that cross, himself, finally.

"Just read it out of my head, Mado. Please."

Gregory took both of her hands, pulled them up to his temples, and held her hands there.

Madoka looked up into his eyes and he could tell she was alarmed as well as confused. She shifted to English, probably to see if it worked better for communicating whatever the problem was. "Greg, are you sure? I am not sure I am comfortable invading your mind like I did with 16 Toyotama…"

"Mado, just _look_ and if you can _fix_ it, please, just fix it! Please. I can't fucking take it anymore. I don't care what it takes, please, fix it." He was back to shouting at her in English, but this time it did not make her angry, it just convinced her of how serious his need was.

"Okay, I will look, Ashikabi-kun. I will look."

Madoka closed her eyes and concentrated on seeing Gregory's mind. They had talked about this, about how "seeing" Toyotama's mindscape was one thing and "doing" something within it was another, like how it took a different effort to push Higa Izumi away from Toyotama's consciousness.

This was the _other_ way her Redaction Probe worked. Without using Farsense alongside her Redaction, she ended up looking inside their _mind_ instead of looking inside their skull. She would need to get a good Redaction Probe to _find_ the things in a person's mind she wanted to change, if anything. Then once found, maybe she could _fix_.

It was difficult, she hadn't tried seeing someone's mindscape except for with Toyotama two weeks ago; what she did when she saw and felt things through Gregory when they were having sex was something very different from seeing and interacting with his consciousness, his memories, his mind. She had not been interested in experimenting with this on Gregory, especially considering how much more invasive the Redaction Probe was than the light "mind reading" thing she could do with him to pick up this basic moment-to-moment thoughts. She learned _that_ with Toyotama's memories; she had not even meant to see some of them but even a second's curiosity about a memory and Madoka had been experiencing what Toyotama remembered.

Gregory said that everyone had memories and thoughts that they did not want to share with anyone, even a trusted and beloved other, and that this was normal and even healthy. So she avoided doing more than sharing his sensorium while they had sex or occasionally skimming his surface thoughts for what he was thinking about at the moment.

Now though, something was hurting her Ashikabi and she had to find out what it was so she could heal it!

She "pushed" with her Redaction and found herself in Gregory's mindscape.

o.0.O.0.o

{ _Mind Redact Probe_ }

Gregory's mindscape was very different from the dark atmosphere of Toyotama's. There were no low clouds and cracked dry ground with fires illuminating memories. Instead, Madoka saw silvery bubbles, numbering in the millions, which spread out into an unfathomable distance of white-green sky. The surface of each bubble showed faces or places, events and people in Gregory's life.

It also struck her how different this "Mind Redact Probe" was to the "Farsense-Redact Healing Probe" that she used to view the interior of a body in order to find and heal injury. The Healing Probe was like… using her actual eyes but _inside_ the body, kinda.

But this? She was pretty sure there was no physical location in Gregory's body where there were millions of silvery bubbles and a vast white-green sky.

Focusing on her mission and resisting the temptation to indulge herself by viewing Gregory's memories of her, which several of the silvery bubbles nearby showed, Madoka tried to find her way from all this memory to wherever Gregory's thoughts were, to where _he_ was.

She swiftly located the core of Gregory's consciousness, a dark place where images, sounds, feelings, and thoughts flickered past so rapidly that she had a difficult time understanding them at first. What she did _not_ have a hard time quickly grasping was how powerful they were. Just looking, so that she could understand them, caused her to be yanked into the whirpool of emotions and thoughts.

She felt what it was like to be Gregory as he tenderly cupped her breast, watching her face,as she slept. What it was like for him to come to bed with her waiting for him, the joy that suffused him every time she whispered her love to him. The lust that made his heart race when he looked at her ass in her tight jeans or saw her nipples harden under a shirt. The intense satisfaction that sex with her was. The pride-guilt of _having_ her, of _fucking_ her _pussy_ with his _cock_ …

The torrent of thoughts was pulling at her, growing stronger and more demanding as they went. Madoka was now scared that she would be swept away by the powerful, chaotic, and out of control, feelings. The visions kept appearing and playing out then being replaced by the next, over and over.

The heady rush of joy, happiness, or satisfaction that each scene contained was countered by pain and constant awareness of loss in other scenes, which floated around the edge of the dark place, only occasionally inserting themselves into the looping stream, but still doing their damage. The guilt he felt over his infidelity to his wife, the great sadness of the loss of his daughter. Shame at the realization he felt the loss of his daughter more than he cared about the loss of his wife. The guilt he felt at giving into his own desires and taking her…

The worst though were where memories of this week where Gregory was at his job; he was trying to do his job, take care of his responsibilities, but he _could not stop thinking of her_. _She_ wanted to weep for how much it hurt to be away, _she_ wanted to toss everything aside, grab ahold, and never let go of the girl/her in Gregory's thoughts.

She understood now what was hurting him so much.

She looked on in shock at how wretched Gregory felt and how he was literally suffering because of how he felt about her. In a more innocent time, she would have thought it flattering for a man to obsess over her, but seeing it like this, feeling it, herself? This was worse than Toyotama's memories of flogging 101 Oriha. Only a fool who did not know what she was talking about would wish this on anyone, much less upon someone who cared for her.

She tried to step back, to distance herself at least a bit. She was holding on by her fingertips against a raging flood of emotions. And then she was not watching but _being_ the girl Gregory thrust into with desperate intensity, his desire devouring her, to make her his, which she _already was_ but he did not believe it.

The strength of Gregory's attachment to her and attraction to her was pushing him over the edge, and she knew she could not afford to be carried away or she would never be able to help her Ashikabi.

There. Just that thought, " _help her Ashikabi_ ", seemed to have power. With a great sigh of relief, she stepped back from Gregory's moment-to-moment awareness, leaving him hugging that girl to his chest, and she considered what she could do to _help her Ashikabi_.

Madoka made a mental note to remember those magic words in case she got in trouble again.

She could now perceive the entirety of all the memory bubbles and she could see multi-colored threads that connected them, how the threads also connected to streams of spoken and written words in English and Japanese that made up part of what she understood as "thinking". She clearly made out that there were areas in the distance where darkness covered sections of the bubbles and the streams.

Moreover, she could now appreciate that the deep darkness covering all the space near where the core of Gregory's awareness resided was an injury, a disease, a wound, which needed to be healed or he could be lost to it.

It was all so complex! How memories and thoughts were intertwined and memories were tied into other memories. Recall of events, memories of feelings, awareness and consciousness and emotions, self-worth and self-doubt, childhood traumas and suppressed fears, all connected in a vast three-dimensional lattice that was _utterly_ beyond her ability to _see_ all of much less understand.

And that… _darkness_ , filling the center. She could _tell_ it was a growing sickness but how could she tweak here and cut there, attach this thought to that memory in a healthy way a million times over in order to get rid of the darkness?

She doubted she would _ever_ be able to consciously, deliberately, treat this kind of injury. This was an order of magnitude more complex than mere brain surgery.

The only thing she could think to try was to do what she used to do for healing, before she learned anything about using the Farsense and Redact Probe to see the inside of her target's body so that she could deliberately repair the torn tissues she found. Before, she would just put her hands on the wound, pour her healing into it, and hope that it fixed itself.

But this hurt was so large, so strong, it so dominated every part of Gregory's current awareness! How could she fill all of that space with healing? It would take more energy than she had in her whole body!

Oh. Yes!

And she knew then what she could do.

{ _End Mind Redact Probe_ }

o.0.O.0.o

Madoka opened her eyes and looked up at her Ashikabi's unhappy face. Without moving her hands from his temples, she lifted herself up on her tiptoes and kissed him, gently, lovingly. Her bright yellow wings flared out behind her, illuminating the entire loft in neon fluorescence.

Before he could return her kiss, before he could realize and act upon the irresistible impulse to grab her and take her back to their bed, an impulse that _she_ felt through her connection to him, she broke the kiss and spoke, her hands still on either side of his head.

" _By the life of my pledge, may the harm to my Ashikabi be cured_ _ **."**_

She waited, watching his face, hoping beyond hope that it had worked. Gregory took a deep breath and released it with a huge sigh, tension draining from his expression and his body.

He smiled.

Madoka asked, "Do you feel better now?"

Gregory laughed, his baritone voice strong and happy. He answered, "Do I feel better now? Yes! I feel great, actually. Better than I've felt in, well, forever!"

She wrapped her arms around his slim waist and squeezed. "Oh, Gregory-kun! I am so glad. I was so worried."

When she realized he wasn't hugging her back she relaxed her grip and leaned back to look up at his face.

The embarrassed expression he wore, and his refusal to meet her eyes, caused her to worry. "Gregory-kun?"

"Um, yes? I'm sorry, but… who are you, miss?"

Madoka sighed and dropped her face into her hands. She growled, "No!" She shook her head in disgust. "It looks like the easiest way for my Norito to 'heal' the problem of you thinking about me too much was to make you to forget who I am! Now I have to fix that!"

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

From the Notebooks of Gregory O'Donnell

_**Metapsychics** _

**_Metapsychic Abilities_ **

_Farsense_ (New Data) – With practice, Madoka can now use her Farsense metafaculty combined with her "healing" ability of Redaction to visually see within a target's body (aka a "Healing Probe"). The point of view of her perception moves to a spot inside the target body, allowing her to search out and find damaged tissues and once located she can exert her Redaction metafaculty to repair the damage. She is, essentially, a walking MRI/Cat-scan/X-Ray machine, with far higher resolution than any technological method we've discovered yet for seeing within a body.

_Redaction_ (New Data) – Madoka is now able to easily differentiate between the two types of Redaction Probe she has discovered.  
Using her Farsense/Redact Probe (aka "Healing Probe") allows her to "see" inside a patient's body, her point-of-view literally moves within the patient. This provides for the deliberate use of Redaction to heal, for example joining together two pieces of muscle which have torn apart, which is far more energy efficient than her previous "just pour healing energy into it until it is fixed" technique.  
Alternatively, using her Redact alone to probe a patient's mind (aka "Mind Redact Probe") she enters a visual representation of their mind, with memories and thoughts and many other elements she can't identify yet, all laid out for her to examine, as opposed to viewing the brain matter inside the skull cavity. She _can_ view the brain in the skull cavity, but that's by using the aforementioned Healing Probe (Farsense+Redaction).  
What this means for advancing humanity's understanding of the structure of the mind, the nature of thought itself, is beyond my ability to imagine. I only know that we cannot afford to let this amazing young woman be killed in some senseless "game" such as what MBI and that fucking lunatic Hiroto Minaka are forcing upon the Sekirei.

_**MBI** _

**_MBI Elements_ **

As neither Madoka nor I have been informed what the official designations are for these elements of MBI's operation are actually called, we have taken to referring to the presumed aspects of MBI that we are most likely dealing with by the following terminology:

_Sekirei Plan Operations Management_ – The presumed executive element of MBI's Sekirei Plan Operations department in charge of overall decision-making as well as handling the day to day issues of running the Sekirei Plan. It would be personnel in this element who would make decisions about whether a Sekirei or Ashikabi were breakitng rules of the "game" and if so, what sanction was appropriate for that violation. One assumes they would also be monitoring the secrecy so important to the First Phase as well as planning for execution of the later Phases.  
We assume that Hiroto Minaka resides at the top of the Sekirei Plan Operations Management org chart, but have no assurance that is actually the case. That fucking lunatic would not be the first figurehead ruler of an organization.

_MBI Intelligence_ – The presumed element of MBI's overall Sekirei Plan Operations department that is responsible for collecting and checking all data about the Sekirei and their Ashikabi. It is assumed this element of Sekirei Plan Operations tracks the purchases made with the MBI Platinum Cards as well as other data such as cell phone usage, GPS location tracking, human intelligence about the Ashikabi (family names, addresses, employer info, etc).

_MBI Security_ – The presumed element of MBI's overall Sekirei Plan Operations department that is responsible for acting on directives issued by the Operations Management, aka, The Muscle.  
Madoka says they were all informed that a Sekirei was held back from participation in the Sekirei Plan to be part of MBI's enforcement efforts, known by the ridiculous moniker of "The Disciplinary Squad". Why one Sekirei would be a Squad is a mystery. Madoka says she got the impression that in the past there were more members of this unit but that at the start of Phase One there was only one member.  
No information on _which_ Sekirei makes up this "Disciplinary Squad" was given to Madoka before she was released into the city. Nor was any information on this enforcement group given to the Ashikabi during what we will laughably call the "briefing" by Hiroto Minaka after Madoka was winged, so how she or I are to recognize these Security assets and know to follow their orders is a mystery. Like much of what we've seen so far of MBI's information distribution to the Sekirei and, especially, to the Ashikabi, this lack of information about _who the enforcers actually are_ seems yet another clusterfuck of poor planning. If you have cops, the first rule is to make them identifiable AS COPS.  
MBI Security would be the primary users of MBI Intelligence data (though Operations Management would also likely use MBI Intelligence data significantly as well), especially in cases where Operations Management decides to sanction some rule-breaking activity by a Sekirei or Ashikabi. This element may also be responsible for dealing with keeping the Sekirei Plan secret by way of intercepting media and communications, though that could very well be a separate element.

* * *

Started Jan 13 2015  
Completed Jan 18 2015  
Final Edits Jun 9 2015  
Posted Jun 21 2015


	2. NGFOM 4.2 - Recovery

**No Game For Old Men**

Book 4.2 – Ch 11 Recovery

 _Author's Note: Yes, Madoka and Gregory are in a newly intimate relationship with each other. Yes, that means sex is on their minds a LOT. That is how people are in newly intimate relationships. This will not be the focus of every chapter from here on out, but it is something talked about quite a bit at first._  
_There is also a plot relevant point to talking about Madoka's evolving views on sex…_

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

One week and **forty-three** Norito's later Gregory was happily back at school teaching English. No longer did he hate every minute away from Madoka, but he was glad to return to her in the evenings. He was back to being figuratively, more than literally, madly in love with his beautiful Sekirei. He knew who she was and remembered everything about the last couple of months.

There was also no more repeat of the time he ran away screaming when she took off her shirt and exposed her tits. Nor was there any recurrence of the three straight hours of violent, animalistic, sex that had only ended when Gregory had finally suffered an acute myocardial infarction.

Which took yet _another_ Norito to fix.

Madoka now knew that kissing a man who was having a heart attack, in order to get her Norito to stop that heart attack, is not pleasant. Among a great deal of other new knowledge that she would just as soon have avoided learning over the last week.

Madoka wished she could edit her own memories as easily as she was able to soften Gregory's recollections of some of the more difficult spots. And she'd spent a large part of the last week terrified that she was going to accidentally lobotomize her Ashikabi.

But, all's well that ends well, she told herself.

She _absolutely_ had a new appreciation for just how complex the human mind was, and a new respect for the Principle of Unintended Consequences. She also now had a fair bit of hard-earned experience with her healing ability, both the physical and the mental aspects of it.

" _Call it Redact, Madoka. You can't keep calling it your 'power', the term is Redact," s_ he scolded herself.

The day Gregory finally went to work with a smile on his face, returned to the loft with a passionate kiss for her, enjoyed dinner with her and a movie on the holo-tank, then made love to her, then got to sleep at a reasonable hour, all without any signs of the many troubles of the last week, she visited the Buddhist Shrine that she and Gregory had gone to on New Year's Eve. There, she left a significant cash offering to whatever gods there might be, in thanks that she had eventually been able to set things right.

Then she visited the Catholic Church the O'Donnell's worshiped at and donated another heaping handful of thousand-yen notes.

She _never_ wanted to go through anything like the last week _ever_ again!

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

Thursday, 13 February 2020  
Ebisu neighborhood, Shibuya Ward, Shin Tokyo

Relaxing on the couch at the loft, Gregory was reading over a checklist in the Notebook while Madoka leaned against his side, watching a movie on the holo-tank.

He had been working at this list for the last couple of weeks. At least the parts of the last couple of weeks he could remember clearly. He trusted Madoka to take care of him - more so now than ever before actually - so he was not going to fret about the fuzzy spots in his recent memory.

The parts he could remember were bad enough.

The checklist was primarily security concerns he and Madoka had already addressed, most of them items that had come up as a result of now having a second residence and safe "burner" phones to use.

They now had multiple pseudonymous GPS service accounts with an easy way to make new ones, as many as they needed, any time they changed to new safe-phones. So even if they were only carrying their safe-phones they could easily track each other's location. Gregory had set them up with historical time-stamped tracking of their GPS locations as well so they could not only find where the other was but where they had been and when.

Gregory had set up anonymous cloud storage accounts by the dozens and had programmed both phones to constantly record everything the audio sensors captured, whether it was the mic on the phone, the wireless jaw mics they used, or the tiny mics that were on the outside of the wireless earbuds. The audio immediately streamed to cloud storage, so at any point he could check on what was being heard around Madoka.

He felt incredibly creepy for coming up with that one. But once he explained to Madoka why he thought it was a good idea, she agreed completely. She hadn't even _initially_ reacted as though it were creepy, in yet another rather stark example of how Madoka was _not_ the typical young woman. He could not imagine what his daughter Mishi would have said if he proposed such a thing for _her_ phone.

"Creeper" would be the _least_ of her accusations.

He had still rather insistently explained to Madoka why he thought this was needed. If she disappeared, perhaps having been attacked and terminated and then recovered by MBI, at least this way Gregory could review the audio log and know what had happened. With GPS tagging he also would know when and where everything in the audio log occurred.

Perhaps it was cold comfort, but anything would be better than the likely fate for most Ashikabi's, where they saw their Sekirei head to the store for some food and then the Sekirei disappear without a trace. Then the Ashikabi would never know their Sekirei's fate, because MBI certainly felt no obligation to notify an Ashikabi that he was no longer an Ashikabi. They didn't give new Ashikabi's an 800 number to call with questions or to make inquiries, that's for sure.

MBI certainly didn't provide anything like Sekirei dot com slash mysekireistatus.

In addition, such audio recordings would give them opportunity to review in greater detail any new encounters such as the one Madoka had experienced with 16 Toyotama.

To make himself feel better about the niggling creep factor that was still bothering him, Gregory set up the exact same monitoring and recording on his own phones, both his regular phone and his safe phones. He then made sure Madoka had access to _that_ cloud storage and could easily pull up the audio logs and the cross referenced GPS historical data and that she could review them from any of her phones or her tablet.

That helped ease his conscience, a bit. Still seemed creepy though.

He pushed that feeling away. This situation was really too important for non-productive sentiments, and his fear of seen as a middle-aged creeper-stalker or as a psychotic control freak was non-productive. Gregory was honest enough with himself to admit that Madoka wasn't the only one with stupid cultural hang-ups that needed to be ignored for the sake of practicality and security.

It sure was a lot easier to point them out in other people though.

Each of the safe-phones was set up to automatically upload everything from their cameras as well, whether video or still shots. Gregory did the same with his actual cameras; the big Nikon v10 as well as the more snapshot appropriate Sony RX1000 that he carried everywhere.

If MBI or any other authority tried to take their cameras and destroy the internal memory it would not do them any good. Some of the cloud storage accounts were with services in places like Beirut. Gregory would like to see MBI try to force access to those accounts.

They had purchased a hundred new pre-paid smart phones, with cash, making the salesman's day at the LG store in Ginza. Nice anonymous cellular and data traffic, identified to the networks only by hardware IDs and use-once account information from the data carrier. The prepaid phones were kept in a box near the stairway leading down to the exit from the loft. There was a large whiteboard mounted on the wall above the box, with a column for Gregory and a column for Madoka. Any time they felt they should change out an old safe-phone for a new one - whether the prepaid data and voice was out or if they even suspected the phone had been compromised - they could update the whiteboard with the new safe-phone's number so that the other person could update their own phone contact list.

Gregory added a few new items to the list in his hand, mostly concerning stocking the loft with more supplies. They'd found several of their favorite high-end restaurants had pre-packaged gourmet meals from their outstanding kitchens, so Gregory planned on filling the loft's freezer with boxes and boxes of these quick-microwave meals. They had tried a few already and they were _delicious_ , though _very_ expensive compared to regular frozen dinners or take-out.

But MBI was footing the bill so Gregory was amused at the expense more than concerned. So he added a line item to purchase 50 breakfast, 25 each of lunch and dinner packages from the Ritz-Carlton's prepackaged café service, to be picked up by Gregory in person, not for delivery. It was 10 minutes to drive from here to the Ritz-Carlton Tokyo over in Minato Ward, 3.5 kilometers by car. Easy enough to just drive over there in the Jeep and load up at the restaurant's commercial door. The Ritz-Carlton serviced the American embassy with that line of prepared meals, among other high-end accounts, so they knew their business. All of the meals were western-style so they were higher in calories, carbs, and fat than Japanese-style meals. And that was essential for keeping Madoka fed and healthy; his Sekirei could easily go through 5000 calories a day and it certainly didn't turn into fat!

Another line item added, to get a new freestanding freezer delivered to the storage rental a block from the loft. Pain in the ass that was, but it was better to hire random young men to carry a freezer a block to the loft than to have an appliance company have the loft's address on file.

He hoped the precautions they were taking were good enough. But he had no way to really know. Not until it was too late. But that was the nature of defending yourself, wasn't it?

Gregory chuckled to himself. He was glad he'd "wasted" so much of his time in his adolescence and young adulthood playing computer games and pen-and-paper role-playing games. The effect those hobbies had on his problem solving skills and how they taught him novel ways to approach unusual challenges which lay outside of his formal education and professional skill set could not be overstated. He felt badly for many of the young Japanese Ashikabi who - even if they were gamers - were established in the Asian style of gaming where instead of problem solving using your character's skill sets and your own detailed understanding of the game rules and systems you instead made progress by simply enduring until out of the blue the gods granted you some new super powered ability that would defeat the next big challenge. Then endure more grinding until another miraculous ass pull gave you your next super attack to use on your enemies.

He wondered if there were Ashikabi-Sekirei couples who were experiencing exactly that in the Sekirei Plan. Just coasting along inside the box MBI had defined for them and occasionally the Sekirei "discovered" out of thin air some amazing new attack form to add to her repertoire.

Gregory leaned a bit towards Madoka and kissed the top of her head on impulse. She turned to look up at him and smiled, then squeezed his hand, before returning her attention to the holo-tank and her movie. " _Jurassic World 3"_ he thought it was, vaguely remembering taking Karen and Mishi and Tomo to see it when it was released last summer.

She was certainly enjoying it, which brought a smile to Gregory's face. He made a mental note to try to spend less time in bed with Madoka and more time going out and doing things a young woman would enjoy doing. She seemed to be content with spending entire weekends doing nothing but eating takeout and screwing like rabbits, but there was more that Gregory wanted to show her of what life had to offer.

Especially if she really was destined to fall in MBI's insane Sekirei Plan.

A beep from his tablet got Gregory's attention. It looked like someone had posted something on the Sekirei and Ashikabi Google+ page. He tabbed over to the Google+ app and looked for the comment.

||76sAshikabi: I hate you so much; my Sekirei won't leave off about getting pictures taken like you have of your Sanjunana. Let's talk, eh? ;)

Gregory smiled and thought, " _Bingo, got one!"_ Now to see if he could set up a meeting somewhere public, maybe next week.

||37sAshikabi: Heh, I feel your pain friend. Let's have lunch, maybe a week from Saturday? You and your Sekirei and me and mine, and talk. No one is going to try anything funny in a restaurant, eh?

||76sAshikabi: Yeah, let's do that. I'll admit I was wondering about how to know for sure about meeting other people in this crazy game and being safe. Somewhere real public, that's a good idea. Are you anywhere near Nakano Ward?

||37sAshikabi: Yep, Shibuya Ward, so just south of there. So let's have lunch at one of the restaurants around Shinjuku Central Park. There's lots of good food places there and we can go to the park to take photos if your Sekirei likes the idea. Talk to her, and then let me know where for sure. We are looking forward to meeting you both.

||76sAshikabi: You want us to pick the place to eat? Okay, most restaurants in that part of town is a little out of my price range I'm not ashamed to say. I know; I work over there at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government complex.

||37sAshikabi: That's why my MBI card will be treating us. So pick out a place you two would like to try. I'm sure Sanjunana and I will enjoy it.

||76sAshikabi: Hah! Good point! Okay, I'll message you with a place next week.

Gregory closed the Google+ app on the tablet then asked Madoka, "Pause the movie for a minute, sweetheart?"

After she had done so, he said, "We need to plan exactly how we're going to approach other Ashikabi and Sekirei couples. What sort of things we will do to make sure it's not an ambush, what we can do to make sure they don't intend to betray us later, what phones we will carry, what cameras, what we will talk about, what we won't talk about. Everything."

She turned around on the couch to face him. "You mean our tactics. Since our strategy of meeting other Sekirei and Ashikabi couples in order to make friends and allies is beginning to bear fruit." Gregory nodded his agreement with her summary, happy that she remembered the terminology and was ready to think in the correct framework. She added, "I am guessing that someone has contacted us. Who is it?"

He grinned and nodded. "Yep! Number 76 and her Ashikabi. The four of us are going to have lunch somewhere public, not this coming weekend but the next, the 22nd."

Madoka considered that, her expression pensive. "I do not know anything about number 76. Yes, we do need to think about and plan our tactics for about exactly how we will go about such a meeting, in detail."

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

Saturday, February 15th 2020  
Muromachi District, Chou Ward, Shin Tokyo

Gregory leaned against the large windows of the room he and Madoka had rented for the weekend. As it was Valentine's Day weekend Gregory had felt they should go for the very best accommodations they could find in Shin Tokyo.

And the very best meant the Mandarin Oriental Hotel.

Good enough for His Imperial Highness the Crown Prince Naruhito, and his wife, Her Imperial Highness the Crown Princess Masako, to call it their favorite hotel in all of Japan?

Then adequate for Valentine's Day for his beautiful Sekirei. If barely.

From the vantage of their room, high on the north west corner of the Mandarin Oriental's gleaming skyscraper, Gregory could see Mount Fuji to the west. In the late dim twilight the last bit of sun was illuminating the sacred peak with gold, in contrast to the deep purple and blue of the evening sky. Also to the west, but much closer, walking distance from the front doors of the Mandarin Oriental really, were the grounds of the Imperial Palace. He could see the simulated torchlight around what little remained of the Edo Castle from his vantage on the 38th floor, and the rest of nighttime downtown Shin Tokyo spread out around the hotel.

Yellow-lit ancient Japan alongside the most advanced technopolis in the world.

He and Mado had been greeted with champagne and strawberries on their arrival at their room and they had snacked on amazing sushi and fresh fruits from the hotel's welcome-bento-box. Last night they had enjoyed an eight-course dinner of the best Cantonese cuisine Gregory had ever experienced and tonight it was sushi at the hotel's acclaimed "Sushi SORA".

The Mandarin Oriental's portion of the weekend's bill, for just the room, was costing MBI ¥441,000, and that just made every moment of it that much sweeter.

" _Giving people an unlimited MBI card? What the fuck were they thinking? That we'd use it to buy rice at the market and splurge on meat once a week? Maybe we'd use it to pay rent on an old Inn room with a pushy landlady and where we would be thrashing the tatami with sticks once a week as part of our chores?"_

Really, it was to laugh.

He made a mental note to talk to Mister "76sAshikabi" next week at their lunch and make sure they knew how to best use their MBI card. Assuming the meeting went well, at least. The fellow hadn't immediately thought of using the MBI card for their lunch, so he was probably being paranoid yet stupid about the card. Maybe Gregory should write up a pamphlet for new Ashikabi's, "How to Rape your MBI Platinum Card for Fun and Profit!"

Gregory refocused his eyes to the reflection he cast in window, appreciating the black suit MBI had been kind enough to purchase for him to wear while taking his lovely Madoka for acclaimed sushi. Gregory was not sure what "trofeo wool" was or if the "Ermenegildo Zegna" designer label on the suit was impressive or not, but it sure as hell made for a comfortable suit and he had to confess he looked sharp in it. Did he care it cost MBI ¥300,000? Only inasmuch as it amused the hell out of him.

He looked at the reflection of the deluxe corner room behind him, the very comfortable king sized bed immaculately made in spite of how many times he and Mado had messed it up already, the soft ivory walls and rich brown carpets.

You could practically taste the _Inyodo_ , the Japanese version of Feng Shui.

Gregory wondered at what it was going to be like readjusting to the life of a schoolteacher, after all this was over. A month's rent on his family's spacious, by Japanese standards, apartment in the upscale Shibuya Ward was less than _half_ of what the room bill was for this weekend.

He watched the reflection of Madoka step out of the utterly decadent bathroom that their corner suite boasted. She was carrying her high heels in hand and approaching him in the blue dress she had bought Wednesday when he had taken her shopping. They lived in Shibuya, _the_ shopping and fashion center of Japan. They had fled from 86 Katsuragi down Omotesandō Avenue, where Louis Vuitton, Prada, and Dior had their flagship stores and retailers from Gucci to The Gap rented space by the square millimeter and were damn glad to get it. The street was called "Tokyo's Champs-Élysées" and there were many who considered the Omotesandō the better of the comparison.

And his Sekirei only knew it as the street they'd fled for their lives on? No, that could not stand.

Therefore, this time, instead of running for their lives down the Omotesandō in the Jeep, he took her shopping there. Well, Gregory escorted her and MBI took her shopping.

He let her pick out everything, including the black suit by Zegna that he was wearing tonight.

For her dress this evening, the Alexander McQueen fashion house appreciated MBI's patronage.

Gregory admitted he didn't know couture from coat rack, but he had to acknowledge that the blue silk dress Madoka had picked out for herself looked entirely divine on her.

Then, she could make cardboard look divine.

"Zip me up, Gregory-kun?"

He turned away from the window and the darkening view of Mount Fuji and smiled down at his Sekirei. "Of course, Mado-chan. And when we return from dinner let's have more of the chocolates you gave me for Valentine's?"

Gregory zipped up her dress for her, and he could make out her pleased smile as she held up her cascade of blonde hair and turned her head slightly to glance back at him.

She moved to lean against the window, striking a bit of a pose for him to admire her dress. "What do you think, Gregory-kun?"

"Mado-chan, that is possibly the most beautiful dress I've ever seen."

She smiled happily at that.

"And for the crime against God and Nature of covering up your divine body, it should be shredded and burned and the ashes scattered, as a warning to any other clothing which dared consider hiding you from my eyes."

She was still laughing at that as the elevator doors closed behind them, whisking them away to their dinner reservations.

"You goof. I love you, Gregory-kun."

"And I love you, Mado-chan."

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

Monday, Feb 17th 2020  
Yoyogi District, Shibuya Ward, Shin Tokyo

Gregory and Madoka had intended to make a point of spending at least some weeknights at the O'Donnell apartment but that fell through quickly. They ended up staying at the safe house exclusively for almost a month straight after Madoka and her Ashikabi finally became lovers.

Sure, Madoka visited the apartment by bicycle, to pick up the MBI Platinum Card to hit the ATM's. And Gregory dropped by to grab a change of clothes and leave the Jeep parked while he then took the train to the Ebisu neighborhood the safe house was in. But those quick drop-in-and-go visits weren't adequate for actual housekeeping.

So, the first time the two visited the apartment, with the intention of inspecting the place after almost a month of staying at the loft, was a minor disaster.

One cannot just leave for a month and expect the garbage in the bin or the food in the refrigerator or the inevitable can of soda left in the teenager's bedroom to not evolve into a hostile life form.

They also held a somber toilet-based funeral for Mishi's goldfish. Madoka felt badly for forgetting Mishi's little fish tank and she struggled with how she felt about the deaths of the two fish. She realized she had never known anything or anyone to die, and this was even her fault, in a roundabout way.

It was a very unpleasant feeling.

Gregory was quiet and withdrawn for a while after they disposed of the goldfish. Madoka knew there was little she could do for him when he fell into thoughts of his daughter.

Gregory told her, "I bought those for her, she promised to take good care of them and she did. It was the first time I'd seen her be responsible for something other than just herself."

He was even more depressed after he wrote Mishi an email explaining that her fish had died. Madoka pleaded with him to just not tell her; surely Mishi would not find out otherwise. Gregory insisted it was the right thing to do, even though he knew Mishi would write back with even more anger at him than she had already displayed.

Madoka could only wish her Ashikabi was not hurting, but she could not and should not heal this injury to his spirit. He loved his daughter almost to the point of unreason and had focused a great deal of his self-image on being "Mishi's Dad", even more than of being "Karen's Husband" or an "English Teacher in High School". Madoka found Gregory's emotional distance from his son, Mark, confusing, but she left that issue alone. She didn't know Mark O'Donnell so he did not really matter to her. But she knew Mishi.

Unlike Gregory's casual acceptance of his son's absence, the loss of Mishi in his life was an open psychological wound that Madoka had _seen_ in his mind and she no longer had the hubris to think she could, or even should, fix it. It would heal by itself over time and meanwhile there would be these periods where Gregory hurt for his losses.

They spent the first night cleaning and throwing out spoiled foodstuffs. They were both tired enough that Gregory's insistence that they not sleep together in the master bedroom was no real problem. Madoka collapsed onto the slightly musty sheets and blanket of Mishi's bed and was out like a light until she was woken by the sounds of Gregory leaving for work in the morning.

Madoka only lounged in bed for a short time after Gregory left. After spending so much time at their safe house, she was no longer comfortable in Mishi's bed, or Mishi's bedroom. She showered, dressed, and then reviewed her to-do list as well as checked her phone for messages from Gregory about anything he needed her to do today.

One nice thing about being at the apartment was being able to use her Christmas present Samsung phone. _And_ it was really nice not having to worry about whether it was okay to use the MBI Platinum Card for concern about tipping off their assumed watchers to Gregory and Madoka's efforts at misleading MBI Intelligence. She and Gregory had to carefully plan for when they were going to use the MBI Card; using the card required them to start from the O'Donnell apartment with their "unsafe" phones in their possession and then return to the O'Donnell apartment. What location MBI logged their "unsafe" phones at was something both of them had to keep in mind at all times, especially when it came to using the card. Use the card while MBI thought Gregory and Madoka were still at the O'Donnell apartment, because their phones were registered as being at that location? Then, no doubt, red flags would pop up in MBI Intelligence's systems, letting the monitors know that Gregory and/or Madoka went shopping and left their phones at the apartment, which was something they did _not_ want MBI considering. They wanted MBI to believe that Gregory and Madoka, like everyone else in Shin Tokyo, took their phones everywhere and that MBI could depend on the information phone GPS tracking gave them.

This complicated everything they needed to do with the MBI Platinum card, from buying assets such as the pre-paid burner phones to the withdrawal of cash from the ATM's daily. Living full time at the safe house, which had not been the plan when they'd rented it, was becoming something of a security-pain-in-the-ass. Gregory was making noises about renting another location in the city to be a real safe house, at a location neither of them visited except when absolutely necessary so that MBI Intelligence (and whoever had compromised MBI Intelligence's systems, like 22 Kochou on behalf of Higa Izumi) had less a chance of knowing about the place. Madoka was already very much in favor of that plan and just letting MBI Intelligence find out about the Ebisu neighborhood loft.

Gregory had been rather put out with himself for missing the problem with the MBI Card and the phones. Madoka was the one who had spotted the problem and pointed it out to Gregory just before he was about to use the MBI Platinum Card to make a purchase while the unsecure phones were still logged at the O'Donnell apartment.

He used that as proof of how her opinions and thoughts about security procedures were just as valid as his own were, a point that she had been arguing against, mildly, up until that incident. Now she believed him; he really was capable of screwing up due to not thinking about something! Now she felt a little silly for thinking Gregory was immune to making mistakes, even making the occasional boneheaded mistake, which could screw up their entire security situation. He was no more perfect than anyone else, Ashikabi or no.

She loved him _more_ now, for his imperfections. And she understood that it was both of their jobs to watch out for their security, to cover for each other's blind spots and mistakes.

Going over her list while sipping fresh brewed coffee at the breakfast table, Madoka recognized that she did not really have enough to keep her busy. Looking around the apartment, she did not feel the same interest in cleaning and maintaining that she did at the safe house loft. The O'Donnell apartment had been cleaned enough that it could now be left for weeks and not become a health hazard; that was good enough as far as Madoka was concerned.

She should check the social media pages for any Ashikabi or Sekirei trying to contact them. They were supposed to meet with 76 Midorino and her Ashikabi this coming weekend, and Madoka wanted to at least text with the other Sekirei a little before they all met in person.

There was also her Reading List, if she got bored.

Her Reading List was a file that she had been adding to on Gregory's suggestion. A list of subjects that she found she needed more education about, things they did not teach adequately in the MBI Sekirei Labs, or never even touched on in many cases.

For example, none of the administrators or scientists had ever bothered showing the girls in Group 11 how to properly wear makeup. Or shown them the proper technique for deep-throating cock. There were also entries on her Reading List for Human Anatomy and Physiology; she had a dozen subjects under that heading to read on. She had recently added psychology and psychotherapy subjects. Madoka had to confess, at least to herself, that the science subjects kept getting pushed further and further down her Reading List in favor of more entertaining material. She couldn't help it if anatomy and psychology were more boring than sex or fashion, especially if Gregory wasn't working on the study with her. He had a way of making learning even boring material easier, more fun.

Pouring herself more coffee, Madoka thought about the last study session she and Gregory had on the subject of anatomy and her ability to heal, or harm, as the situation required.

As far as she and Gregory could tell, what she could do, what her Sekirei gifts were, would not be much of a factor in a one-on-one formalized duel to the death. Not when her likely opponents were all much stronger, tougher, and faster, than she was. But there was more to life, more to safety and security for that matter, than being good at combat within the Sekirei Plan's rigid fighting rules.

Gregory had pointed out that she had allowed MBI and Hiroto Minaka's lunacy define her self-worth. Then her Ashikabi had taken great pains to explain just how useful, valuable, and powerful she could be.

Gregory had found it funny that the most effective illustration of her potential had been via his computer game, the one he played online. Just one hour of demonstrating in " _World of Guildwars III_ " what the party healer meant to the survivability of a group did wonders for chipping away at her years of Madoka's self-doubt and poor self-esteem.

And it was Gregory who had pointed out what she had done in her panic and fear, when Toyotama had her on the roof, when she used her Redaction to break Toyotama's arm.

After she had finally told Gregory the whole story of the ambush by Toyotama, they went through the encounter in as much detail as she could remember, over and over, while he took notes. Gregory pointed out to her that she had broken a very strong bone in Toyotama's forearm clean in half just by willing it to break. A fact she had managed to forget in the chaos of what had happened on that rooftop.

He then pulled up an entire page of information on her tablet about "mechanics of materials" so she could understand how strong that bone is and how difficult it is to cause it to break, especially to cause the bone to fail spectacularly enough to cause an audible bang of the sort Madoka remembered.

He suggested that if she ever found herself in that situation again that she should try breaking her attacker's skull instead of their arm. If she couldn't break their skull easily then she should try just breaking their brain.

That suggestion confused Madoka until Gregory explained that attacking the skull is only necessary if you have to physically penetrate the skull to get to what is important: the brain. Surgeons had to make a hole in the body in order to reach inside and affect the body's internal structures. Bullets had to make holes in the skull in order to to get to the important, vulnerable, brain within. But Madoka's Redaction metafunction didn't work like surgery; she could reach inside the body without making holes first.

If she could heal wounds that were still covered by skin, muscle, and even bone then it followed that Redaction could likely _cause_ injuries to bodily locations still covered by skin, muscle, and bone.

Bodily locations like the cavity in the skull where the brain is located.

Gregory was resolute, ruthless, and bloody-minded about the defense of his Sekirei. They spent an entire evening at the loft using their huge three-meter holo-tank to pull up high resolution 3-D images of the human skull, brain, and spine. Gregory pointed out where the smallest effort would result in the maximum carnage.

He worked hand in hand with her, both of them learning everything they could (in one evening) about things like what a cerebral infarction was. They read together about subarachnoid hemorrhage and they discussed how the "thunderclap headache", which was the most common _immediate_ effect of a subarachnoid hemorrhage, would instantly disable most anyone. And it was the _immediate_ symptoms that they were most interested in.

Waiting five minutes for someone's heart to stop beating due to a myocardial infarction just wasn't a practical self-defense plan.

But a thunderclap headache, violent seizures, projectile vomiting, and loss of consciousness, striking within seconds, due to a subarachnoid hemorrhage?

"That sounds awesome!" Madoka was later a little abashed at how eager she'd sounded.

They read about how to locate the Willis Circle arteries in the brain that, if ruptured, would cause an immediate subarachnoid hemorrhage. They picked this particular form of brain damage to study because the Willis Circle arteries were relatively easy to locate in the brain for a novice who had her own built in CT Scan. She could now locate, after some practice on Gregory, the Willis Circle in less than 10 seconds with her Healing Probe. If she could get physical contact with someone else for more than 10 seconds she would try to locate those arteries in them, for practice, of course. So far she'd not had the opportunity to put her hands on someone else for that long, only Gregory.

How long it took, after locating her target, to cause a catastrophic rupture in the arteries depended on several factors, including how brittle the subjects arteries were, whether there was a convenient already-existing cerebral aneurysm just waiting to be popped, and probably a dozen other factors she wasn't aware of yet.

But she at least had a _plan_ for the next time some gang of street thugs tried to rape her.

Evenings spent studying the vulnerabilities of the human body, and specifically the horrors that could be inflicted on the brain if someone could just reach in past the skull, was not what most girls would consider romantic. But the hours Gregory spent with her on their Brain Damage project warmed her heart like nothing she had ever imagined in her adolescent years in which she'd fantasized about what having the love of her Ashikabi would be like.

Anyone could buy their girlfriend flowers. It was _real_ love if they helped their girlfriend learn how to commit bloody carnage.

She and Gregory were honest with each other, though, about the untested nature of this self-defense plan. She might find it impossible to carry it out in a crisis for any number of reasons that they could not foresee. Breaking Toyotama's radius bone in her forearm had been done in a blind panic, an instinctive effort fueled by desperation and utter terror. Maybe that was the only circumstance in which she could strike out with her Redaction.

But at least the plan was _something._ She no longer thought of herself as someone who's fate was to always be the victim, who had no way to fight back against those who would hurt her.

Stepping out onto the O'Donnell's apartment patio and enjoying the morning sun in spite of the cold February temperatures, Madoka took a cigarette out of the spare pack that Gregory kept at the apartment and lit it. Last week while at the safe house she'd been curious about what Gregory got out of the habit enough to try it herself, and she'd learned she liked the menthol cigarettes that he smoked.

Sitting at the patio table with her coffee and Gregory's cigarettes, she looked at her Reading List. There were subjects that interested her more than anatomy and physiology, subjects she _wanted_ to learn more about. Fashion was a good example. Casual, formal, business; she had realized when shopping at Gucci and Prada on the Omotesandō for their Valentine's weekend that there was a vast amount to know about clothes and accessories. Did anyone at MBI even _try_ to educate the female Sekirei about such an important subject? Of course not! It didn't have anything to do with beating someone to death so it was worthless!

"Assholes." she groused, under her breath. Madoka did not think much about how far her attitude towards MBI and the Sekirei Plan had shifted in the two months since she'd become Gregory's Sekirei. Disillusionment with their methods and priorities had accumulated until she had no choice but to agree with Gregory's highly negative view of MBI, Hiroto Minaka, and even the Sekirei Plan itself.

She also needed to update her "Feelings About Stuff" journal. She'd spent half a day in the week leading up to Valentine's Day just catching up on that. There had been a lot she'd had to write, considering she hadn't touched it since before she and Gregory became lovers. She filled many pages chronicling her sexual experiences with Gregory over the previous two weeks, and she described in detail what it was like splitting her awareness between her own sensorium and Gregory's while they had sex.

She _still_ had not told Gregory that she did that, that she could split her awareness equally between her own body and his, while they had sex. She kept meaning to, but the time never seemed quite right.

She took the time now to tap out a new entry in her "Feelings About Stuff" journal, writing at length and with great passion about how incredible _that girl_ looked, felt, sounded, tasted. She was afraid if she said something about it to Gregory that it might jinx the entire thing. She subconsciously resisted taking _any_ action that might cut into her _incredible-sex-with-that-girl_ time.

Taking a draw of cool tobacco smoke then slowly exhaling it, Madoka acquired a vague, distant, expression as she allowed herself to wallow in memories of how marvelous it was to have sex with _that girl._

Shaking her head to clear it, she realized she could keep busy today with no trouble. First thing on her list was the daily cash run to the post-office ATM's, then Gregory had left her a note to purchase something called an Emergency Services Scanner. He mentioned in that note that she would likely need to purchase it at a specialty business, check The Google.

She knew how to use The Google now! And The Wikipedia! The two most important websites in the world as far as she was concerned.

" _Stupid MBI and their treating us Sekirei like mushrooms_." The longer she lived out in the real world the more angry she got at MBI.

So, find a store nearby that sells these Emergency Service Scanners, then head out!

Well… maybe after relieving some tension in the shower first. Her thoughts of making love to _that girl_ were lingering and distracting her. She'd noticed she needed to masturbate more often recently; not only more often but it was also a _lot better_ now than her attempts at self-gratification were back in the MBI Sekirei Labs. Maybe because she felt safer now that she wasn't being watched by cameras and monitors day and night? Madoka did not know. But now hardly a day could go by without her getting so horny but she _had_ to take care of herself at least once, and often more than once, culminating in body-shaking and mind-blanking orgasms the likes of which she had _never_ found possible during her furtive adolescent explorations under the blanket at night in the dorms.

Wasn't it only a few weeks ago that she had felt like her own efforts at self-gratification were too much work for not enough payoff? Madoka pulled up the encrypted journal app on her phone and flipped through her recent entries. Yes, there, January 18th. "Singularly unsatisfying" among other negative descriptions. What had changed in that one month? Was it just that she and Gregory were lovers now and that made her enjoy solo sex more too? She certainly enjoyed it now and felt driven to do it often!

Gregory liked it when she masturbated, too. She hadn't thought of herself as reserved or passive when she and Gregory had sex, but in retrospect she had to admit that for the first few weeks of their lovemaking she had been too overwhelmed with being in Gregory's skin and in his head while simply fucking _that girl_ cross-eyed to do much; she really just rather went along for the ride.

Madoka so _loved_ fucking _that girl_.

But recently things changed, all because one time when she'd "given herself a hand" while they were having sex, during one of those rare moments where she had gotten carried away in what her own body was feeling while Gregory was thrusting into her from behind. Generally, she could not tear much of her attention away from what _he_ was experiencing, especially when he took her from behind like that. But on that one occasion her own body had flashed hot with a bit of the same fire she was used to only feeling in Gregory and all without really thinking about it she'd reached down to rub at her clit while Gregory kept plunging into her.

That was the closest she had managed, so far, in her quest to experience her own orgasm and his at the same exact time. _That_ time her own went off, harder than ever before in her life, then she had Gregory's following right as her own was fading, all in all resulting in a mind-numbing two solid minutes of orgasm for her.

She'd actually lost consciousness. It was _that_ overwhelming. She supposed that even her Sekirei body was not built for that much ecstasy. Maybe she could work up her tolerance?

She grinned wickedly at that idea.

Gregory admitted that he had found it extremely hot that she'd gotten into it enough to take action in giving herself pleasure. He'd then shown her just how erotic he thought it was. Several times in a row, in fact. Then watching herself masturbate through Gregory's senses, while he was doing the same for himself, where she could feel everything her body felt _and_ everything his body felt? Where she was turned on by her own horniness _and_ his? It was like a positive feedback loop of fapping frenzy. _That girl_ making _those_ noises, with _that_ dirty expression on her beautiful face… Just the memories made Madoka's blood boil with desire, more so than anything else she had experienced so far in her rapidly broadening sexual experience.

The memory had Madoka _running_ to the apartment's shower, throwing her clothes off as she went. Enough time to go to the ATM and buy a radio later!

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

That night Gregory picked up take-out Chinese on the way home from work. He had not considered that it might feel awkward having take-out around the O'Donnell's kitchen table without the rest of his family present. Nor had he anticipated that he and Madoka might both be reminded of the last time they ate Chinese take-out there, and Karen's storming away from the table.

In retrospect, that had been behavior from Karen that should have been a warning flag to Gregory but he had been too wrapped up in his own concerns and the then-newly-revealed Sekirei Plan, as well as his new bond with Madoka, to think about it clearly.

At the time, he just wrote it off as Karen being more bitchy than usual. And his willingness to believe his wife was more bitchy "than usual" was not a particularly happy statement about the state of his marriage even at that point.

As the two sat and picked at their sweet and sour chicken with their chopsticks there was not much talk. Finally, Gregory sighed and apologized, "I'm sorry, Mado-chan. I should have picked up something else. Wasn't really thinking."

"Neh, it is okay, Gregory-kun. Sometimes it is hard for me to believe it has been two months since we sat here with Karen-san and Mishi-chan that night. I do not know if I expected then to even still be alive in the middle of February."

Gregory nodded, chewing his mandarin beef absently. As he attempted to pick up something approaching a forkful of rice in his chopsticks, he shook his head and observed, "It seems like so much has happened in the last two months. Certainly, a lot has changed. I don't recognize hardly any part of my life anymore from then."

Glancing over at Madoka, who was staring down at her plate with her hair falling down around her face, Gregory hurriedly added, "And it has changed for the better, Mado-chan. I can't deny I'm sad about Karen and Mishi and my son and the rest of my family in the States. But I'd not go back and change things, even if I could. I count myself a very lucky man being your Ashikabi and an even luckier man being your lover. Lucky beyond what I deserve."

She looked up at that, eyes glittering, and she smiled. "Thank you Gregory-kun. I am very glad that things have worked out as they have, as well."

"Okay, good, then. We're both happy!" Gregory tried grinning across the table, mocking the gloomy atmosphere they had both been wallowing in. That got a genuine giggle from Madoka at least.

In a deliberate attempt to change the mood, he asked, "So, did you find a scanner today?"

Madoka sat up and did her best to shake off the negative mood. She nodded and answered, "Yes, actually. You were right, they are somewhat difficult to find, but there is a store that sells all sorts of radios within walking distance of the Shin-Okubo station."

"Shin-Okubo? That's a couple of stops north on the Yamanote Line?"

Nodding her head, Madoka said, "Yes, not far really, but since we are near the apartment instead of the safe-house I used the MBI card to make the purchase instead of our cash. That was the right thing to do, yes? She expertly grabbed another piece of chicken with her chopsticks.

Gregory considered himself competent with chopsticks, though it took a lot of effort to get to that point, considering he was raised in that third of the world that used forks and spoons for moving food to the mouth. But Madoka was as fast and deft with chopsticks as anyone he'd ever seen. He was a bit envious of her skill, actually.

"Yes, using the card was the right call, certainly. I know you've got the security processes down, you don't need to report to me when you use the card, Mado-chan."

After she swallowed her bite of chicken she replied, "I just do not want to make a stupid error."

"Eh, Mado-chan, don't worry about it so much. Like I said, you've got down everything we've talked about when it comes to keeping out of MBI's view, probably better than I do. Now, since you used the card directly, did you get the best model they had?"

"Two!"

"Good girl!"

"Oh, Gregory-kun, that reminds me, the safe is getting too full. We need to come up with somewhere else to stash some of our emergency cash fund. It's over ¥30,000,000 now and the safe is overflowing every time I open it."

Gregory laughed, "Well, what a terrible problem to have. Thanks for letting me know, I'll think about it. Maybe a pre-paid train station storage locker and a thick-canvas tote bag…"

After clearing away the remnants of dinner, Gregory had her retrieve the scanners and the two of them sat on the couch in the living room and started reading through the instructions and fiddling with one of the surprisingly complex devices. Gregory shook his head in amazement, "In the States this thing wouldn't have ten percent this much gadgetry. If we can figure out how to set it up just right, I'll bet it will do the job perfectly."

"What is it we are trying to make it do, exactly, Gregory-kun?" Madoka had the instructional video for the scanner's set-up playing on her phone but paused it. "I have been curious as to why we needed such a thing."

"I didn't say before? Huh. Well, Mado-chan, don't just be curious, it's okay to ask. I'm sorry, I thought we'd talked about it. My idea was that it would be useful if we could find ways for you to get more hands on practice with the physical injury healing part of your Redaction metafaculty. Unfortunately, we can't just stake out hospital emergency rooms for people coming in with trauma injuries. And I'm not pulling muscles as often as I was, plus that doesn't get you any experience with trauma injuries. I thought perhaps we might acquire a lot of lab rats, there is a place that sells them, and other animals approved for scientific research, and you could practice on those."

"That sounds like a good idea, Gregory-kun. Are rats close enough to people for the practice to help?"

He nodded, "Yes, close enough for this sort of work. A broken bone is a broken bone, a stab wound a stab wound, and so on."

Madoka asked, "Then why the scanner?"

Gregory sat the complex black device down on the coffee table and shrugged, "Well… I realized I probably couldn't stab and beat helpless rats so that you would have injuries on them to heal."

She covered her mouth with a hand and just said, "Oh."

"Yeah. And I figured that probably wasn't something you would want to do either."

She shook her head vigorously.

"Yeah, that's what I thought. Well, instead, I wondered if there was any other way for us to find subjects who were already badly injured, so we wouldn't have to do it to them ourselves. And, well, there are a lot of vehicle accidents, even these days when many of the highways are auto-pilot controlled." Gregory tapped the scanner on the coffee table. "As soon as a car accident happens, a broadcast goes out on the emergency service bands, with all sorts of codes to specify what sort of accident happened, what injuries may be present, all to summon police and fire and the appropriate ambulance services to the scene."

Madoka furrowed her brow then said, "So car crashes? And people are badly injured so if one happened near where we happened to be and we could get to it before the authorities then I could try to help?"

"Exactly Mado-chan. And with all the bells and whistles this scanner has we can set it for a specific area or for a roving area around the gps locator in the device. We can also set filters so only certain types of alerts will come to us. So we could tell it to only notify us if there's an accident within 100 meters of our location and involves serious injury. We don't want to run half a kilometer and realize the accident only dented the bumpers on two cars."

"Great, Gregory-kun, that sounds like a plan!"

"Well, there are a few things about it I'm unsure of."

Madoka set her phone down and headed to the kitchen for a fresh can of tea. She called over her shoulder, "Like what?"

"Primarily, I don't want you to have to see car wrecks that have injuries involved. It's pretty terrible, Mado-chan. Most people never see what thousands of pounds of steel and glass moving at speed can do to a human body and that's a good thing, otherwise we'd all be too terrified to ever use our cars."

Madoka returned and sat next to him on the couch and said, "Oh. Yes. I can imagine that could be very bad."

"Yeah. Very bad. Worse than whatever you're imagining, quite likely. I hate the idea of you seeing something that will give you nightmares for the rest of your life. For that matter, I don't much like the idea of myself seeing the aftermath of a fatality accident either. It's not like I've ever worked as a paramedic and hardened myself to the sight of people's mutilated bodies. I'm an English Teacher at a High School. I've only had to harden myself to the sight of social mutilation of teenagers by other teenagers. And the horrors of improperly diagrammed sentences."

Madoka seemed to appreciate his effort at levity. She gestured to the scanner, which now seemed somehow more threatening now than it had earlier, "Then why…"

Gregory picked up the printed manual for the scanner again and opened it to the programming section before answering. "Because as much as I'd prefer to spare you this, it's needed. And because I can't think of any other way for you to get practice. You _do_ need it; it could be the difference of life and death for me or for you. If we can ever find other Ashikabi and Sekirei to ally with then you healing their injuries would be the primary contribution we would be making to the group. And if all you can do is heal cuts or bruises, or use the huge energy sink of a Norito, it will be more difficult for all of us. Remember how awesome our World of Guildwars III party was when the party healer was kicking ass? And how very not-awesome it was to try the same fight _without_ the healer? That's us, if we can find allies and friends. You, actually. The healer."

"Oh. I did not think of it that way." Madoka pulled her legs up on the couch and hugged them to her chest. She was quiet for several minutes while Gregory continued reading, then she put a hand on Gregory's arm to get his attention.

"Gregory-kun, I too would rather not see people horribly hurt. But I will do it, so that I can learn. There is a lot we do not know, especially about the limits of my healing Redaction, but I think you have the right idea, the only way to find out is to use it and that means finding injured people. I would rather fail the first time trying to heal a wound with a stranger in a car crash than it be you, or Yosuga-chan, if we ever find her."

Gregory smiled at his Sekirei, putting his hand over hers and squeezing gently. "That's very brave, Mado-chan, and I respect the hell out of you for having the courage to do something like this."

Madoka returned his smile and nodded, now set on this course. "Okay, so let us get to programming this thing so we can find people to help, Gregory-kun!"

"One more thing we need to start researching is how long your Norito charge lasts. Tragically, this means we're going to have to do a lot of kissing, but we need to start checking to see if you can tell when it wears off, if it wears off all at once or gradually, how long it takes to wear off to the point you can't use your chant, everything we can measure about it."

His Sekirei squealed in mock fear. "Oh noes! This is your devious plan to capture my maiden lips! I knew it, you fiend!" Madoka scooted away from him on the couch, her face an almost perfect picture of a terrorized young woman.

Gregory watched her out of the corner of his eye and snorted scornfully. "Mado dear, your lips haven't been _anyone's_ definition of 'maiden' since about ten minutes after you took off all your clothes and jumped on me the day number 16 ambushed you."

The thrown pillow from the other end of the couch hit him in the side of the head _much_ harder than he had expected. Much like Madoka's shriek of outrage was louder than he had expected.

As Gregory fell off the couch with his offended Sekirei slapping at his arms he couldn't help but grin. _"Heh. Point to me."_

o.0.O.0.o

o.0.O.0.o

* * *

From the Notebooks of Gregory O'Donnell

_**Terminology** _

**Wing Flare** – The flare of metapsychic power which appears high on the back of a Sekirei when their Ashikabi kisses (or otherwise exchanges bodily fluids, see below) them. Wing Flare occurs at the moment of the Wing Bond being established and it occurs any time after that point when the Sekirei and Ashikabi kiss (assuming the Sekirei isn't already in a Norito Boost state, see below). The duration of the Wing Flare event is 10 seconds (in testing with 37 Madoka only, other Sekirei and Ashikabi may have varying durations of Wing Flare).

 **Wing Bonding** – When an "unwinged" Sekirei kisses (or otherwise shares bodily fluids with, see below) a metapsychically latent (or possibly even metapsychically operant) Terran human the two will establish a metapsychic bond. This bond establishes the Sekirei as subject to her new Ashikabi (the term for the latent metapsychic Terran human in the new relationship). This bond is supposedly unbreakable, the Sekirei by tradition will welcome their new state with some statement including the words "forever and ever" and it appears this is literal. The Sekirei will manifest a sort of tattoo on their upper back, across their shoulders, of the Sekirei Symbol (see earlier entry on the Sekirei Symbol) once they are "winged".

 **Norito Boost State** – The condition of having "extra" temporary metapsychic strength due to a Sekirei's Ashikabi having recently kissed him/her. A Wing Flare event indicates the beginning of the Norito Boost State.

 **Norito Burst** – A special, one-shot, manifestation of a Sekirei's metapsychic powers only accessible to a Sekirei who is in a Norito Boost state. Using the Norito Burst reduces the Sekirei to their normal non-boosted state immediately.

 **Norito Termination** – A Winged and Bonded Sekirei can supposedly be terminated if another Sekirei touches the Sekirei Crest of the target and the attacker recites her own Norito.  
Why this would terminate a Sekirei (or even if this rumored method of termination is legitimate) and through what mechanism is completely unknown at this time.

_**Sekirei** _

**_Norito Boost State and the Norito Burst_ **

There are three separate yet related, phenomenon called "norito" by the Sekirei; the Norito State, the Norito Burst, and the Norito Termination.  
The Japanese definition of the word "norito" is a Shinto prayer that is addressed by worshipers to a deity. 37 Madoka reports there was no religious indoctrination in the MBI Sekirei Labs for the Sekirei raised there; they were informed of the major religions of Japan and educated in the basics of what those religions believed but there was no context given for the Sekirei to understand what religion was or why it was important (or unimportant). Therefore, the origin of the word "norito" for an expression of metapsychic power from a Winged Sekirei is unknown, though likely the word was coined by a researcher in the MBI Sekirei Labs who was familiar with the Shinto concept.  
Regardless of the Sekirei's lack of religion and the possible origins of the word, "norito" is universally agreed among the Sekirei to be the word for this important metapsychic phenomenon.  
In Shinto, the various prayers referred to as "norito" are founded on the concept of _koto-dama_ , the idea that spiritual power resides in words. According to the ancient belief of _koto-dama_ beautiful, correct, words bring about good, whereas ugly, coarse, language can cause evil. Thus, "norito" prayers in Shinto are always expressed in elegant, classical, language.  
As a teacher of languages, I admit I am tempted to incorporate this concept into my lesson plans. Good language causes good events! Bad language causes bad events!  
For the Sekirei, only the Norito Burst (see below) and the Norito Termination require the recital of words. The Norito Boost State (see below) occurs without any verbal cues.

 **Norito Boost State** : When an Ashikabi kisses their Sekirei (after the initial Wing Bonding Kiss) or otherwise the Sekirei takes in bodily fluids from their bonded Ashikabi (so far, as of 16 Feb 2020, kissing/saliva, fellatio/semen, and vaginal sex/semen, have all been confirmed as functional activators for the Norito state) the Sekirei manifests a Wing Flare. Once the psychic Wing Flare has receded the Sekirei is then in a state of higher metapsychic strength, a state we will refer to as their **Norito Boost State**. The degree of increase in metapsychic strength is difficult to determine at this stage as 37 Madoka has a much more difficult time using her Farsight+Redaction to gauge her own strength than in how well she can judge it in others. She says the increase in strength is noticeable, she feels conspicuously, remarkably, stronger. The Sekirei may then continue to operate with her normal metapsychic powers but with this across-the-board power boost of the Norito Boost State.  
Tests with Madoka have shown that the Norito Boost State remains in place for exactly 1 hour from the time of the Wing Flare that initiated it. Whether the Sekirei uses their metapsychic powers a lot, not at all, or only a small amount, during this hour has no effect on the duration of the Norito Boost State. It lasts for one hour, every time, unless the Sekirei uses the second phenomenon, the Norito Burst, in which case the Norito Boost State is immediately forfeited.

 **Norito Burst** : Norito also refers to a strong expression of the Sekirei's metapsychic powers in a single burst. This is supposed to be (according to the stories and myths the Sekirei heard growing up) some sort of major attack (or other expression of their powers if a non-combat Sekirei like Madoka), called into play by the Sekirei reciting a chant or prayer of two lines, in a formal or classical form. Examples that Madoka could come up with were a javelin wielder might pull off a piercing stab capable of punching hole through steel plate or a fist fighter might do a combination of punches that would expect to defeat even the toughest foe if they all land. These attacks are more than mere katas or combos though; they are supposedly an expression of the Sekirei's nature and take a form that pays tribute her devotion to her Ashikabi. While that seems like an awful lot of criteria for an "attack" to fulfill, Madoka is quite insistent that a Sekirei's Norito is a very singular, very personal thing.  
This form of the Norito will be referred to as the **Norito Burst** henceforth.  
The one example we have experienced of using a Norito Burst, so far, is a case where Madoka expressed her own Redaction metapsychic mind healing power in the form of a Norito Burst to heal her Ashikabi of a deep-seated psychological wound. Once she was in a Norito State by kissing her Ashikabi she only needed to touch her Ashikabi then recite a short bit of prose, which came to her at the moment in spontaneous inspiration: " _By the life of my pledge, may the harm to my Ashikabi be cured."  
_ After she recited her Norito, the entirety of the extra energy she received from kissing her Ashikabi (her Norito State) expended itself in one burst of healing power and had a dramatically larger scale effect on the target than she could have accomplished piece by piece with her Redaction, even with the Norito State energy boost in place.

The effect of 37 Madoka's Norito Burst was imprecise and was not something she could define or insist on specifics for. We need to do a great deal more experimentation to quantify exactly what can and cannot be done via Norito Burst and the Redaction metafunction, both the physical injury healing aspect of Redaction and the mind healing-modification aspect of Redaction.  
In testing with 37 Madoka it was determined that any time a Sekirei is not in a Norito State they can be put in a Norito State by their Ashikabi, _unless the Sekirei had used a Norito Burst to leave the Norito Boost State_.  
If a Sekirei expends their Norito Boost State by using the Norito Burst they are then _unable_ to be placed back into a Norito Boost State by their Ashikabi via the usual methods, until one hour has passed from the initial Wing Flare that put the Sekirei in a Norito Boost State.  
If we find a Sekirei who has a more physical form of metapsychic powers and a more physical sort of Norito Burst we might test on, we will report those results at that time. But so far it appears that a Sekirei can only utilize one Norito Burst per hour. Ideally they would use the Burst at the end of an entire hour of enjoying the across the board boost of the Norito Boost State, then immediately recover their Norito Boost State for another hour via their Ashikabi.  
It is unknown why the same Norito chant/prayer used to trigger a _Norito Burst_ would also be the verbalization used by an attacking Sekirei to terminate a Winged and Bonded Sekirei via _Norito Termination_ (see Terminology, above). I hope to have the opportunity to have 37 Madoka investigate the effects of Norito Termination on another Sekirei, using her Mental Redact Probe. We may be able to reverse or prevent this sort of termination if we can find out exactly what is going on in the targeted Sekirei's body and mind when they are subjected to a Norito Termination.

* * *

Started 19 Jan 2015  
Complete 6 Jun 2015  
Posted Jun 21 2015


	3. NGFOM 4.3 - Slice of Life

**No Game For Old Men**

Book 4.3 – Ch 12 Slice of Life

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/  
\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

Wednesday, 19 February 2020  
Roppongi neighborhood, Minato Ward, Shin Tokyo

In the middle of February, to celebrate the two-month anniversary of the night Madoka and Gregory bonded, he _finally_ took Madoka out for Karaoke. It had taken him a bit of research to find the right club but he had scored a lucky break earlier in the week when one of his Senior English students - a young woman from one of the wealthy old nobility families - noticed his personal tablet open on his desk and displaying "exclusive karaoke club" search results.

She glanced up from Gregory's tablet to meet his eyes with a thoughtful expression on her aristocratically beautiful face. When Gregory raised an eyebrow she narrowed her eyes and then, with a smirk on her lips, she wrote on a scrap of paper a phone number, a club name, and an address in Minato Ward. The address was actually inside the chic hypermodern _Roppongi Hills_ district of Minato Ward, a huge pseudo-arcology that dominated the Ward. She passed this information to Gregory as though it were state secrets of the Imperial Family. She murmured in her rather good English, "Mister Gregory, if you are looking for the very best place and you are not concerned about expense, this is the only choice. When you call to make reservations, do please give them my name and that I ask they take good care of you."

It turned out she was quite right, it was a nice place and it was _impossible_ to make reservations until he gave her name.

Before he left for work Wednesday morning he had let Madoka know that they were going out for karaoke and that she should make sure to memorize a few songs if she could because he very much wanted to hear her sing. And wear something nice but not formal!

She looked dazzling when he met her at the loft to walk to the nearby Ebisu train station; her blonde hair was dyed ebony at the ends and was bouncy shiny. Her always perfect skin looked somehow even more smooth, like tanned porcelain. She'd apparently spent part of her day buying new clothes and visiting one of the many excellent salons in the Ebisu neighborhood. It took an act of will to go ahead with his plans for their two-month anniversary as Ashikabi and Sekirei, instead of simply spending (yet another) night at their loft, having sex until he passed out from exhaustion.

"Mado-chan, you look amazing. Sexy. Gorgeous."

She smiled, almost bashfully. "Thank you, Gregory-kun. And you look very handsome as well! I am so excited we are finally going to karaoke! I read about clubs and what people do there and what to order to drink and everything. I have very much been looking forward to it."

Gregory laughed, tickled that his tendency to research new things as thoroughly as possible before committing to them had rubbed off on her. He took her hand as they walked over the small bridge crossing the Shibuya River behind their loft. "I hope the place I picked meets your expectations, the name alone should be a good omen."

He refused to say more, to her frustration and his amusement, so they took the Hibiya Line train from Ebisu to Minato Ward. Roppongi was just a few kilometers closer to the center of Tokyo than their home Shibuya and it was, if possible, even more modern and intensely commercial. They walked from the train station drop-off through the beautiful Roppongi Hills grounds; parks and walkways winding their way through and among the skyscrapers, which housed museums, hotels, restaurants of every sort imaginable, and retail stores for any brand you might desire. Gregory had visited Roppongi Hills once, years back, with Karen and Mishi, and had always struggled with finding the right word to describe the place. It covered a very large city block in the west of Shin Tokyo, in Minato Ward. It was part shopping mall, part outdoor park, part office campus for high tech firms. He privately thought of Roppongi Hills as a possible precursor to full-fledged arcologies; entirely self-contained municipalities science-fiction city planners had long speculated and that Gregory considered most likely to occur in Shin Tokyo before anywhere else on Earth.

The club they were visiting tonight was unique among Shin Tokyo karaoke clubs, from what he had read about it. Most karaoke clubs in Tokyo focused on private boxes for couples and small groups of friends; appropriate given the privacy-seeking nature of even young Japanese people who wanted to go out and party. But _this_ place dedicated most of its space to a large public bar and a professional quality stage for performing for the crowd. It was a style of karaoke club far more common in the west than in Japan, but Roppongi Hills _was_ a more western sort of place than you would find in the rest of Shin Tokyo.

Madoka laughed softly, delighted, when they approached their destination, the signs indicating "Mado Lounge" cluing her in on Gregory's little joke. The pair walked right in thanks to the reservations Gregory had arranged, though the door guards looked over Madoka before letting the couple in to confirm their reserved table, which let Gregory know that the place had standards for their patrons to meet that even money might not be able to overcome. By himself, he might never get in the door. But following Madoka? Please, right this way, Miss, let us know if there is anything you need, Miss!

Ah, life really was different for those who looked like idols and were rich. Neither category fit Gregory O'Donnell but he was glad to play tourist, in Madoka's company.

They found themselves standing in the hypermodern all-white entryway of the large club, looking at hundreds of enthusiastic, and somewhat drunk, young adult Japanese partygoers. Most were aged from _maybe_ 18 to mid-20's and were dressed in obviously new styles from the trendiest labels; everyone was wearing Lauren, Hillfiger, Brooks, and even some Armani here and there.

Mado Lounge _was_ very popular with the braver young adults in Tokyo, especially the wealthy trust fund kids and other rich, idle, young people who tried to fight off ennui with decadence and outrageous behavior. This was definitely _not_ the typical Shin Tokyo karaoke bar patronized by the drunken salaryman.

Gregory's eyes scanned the second-level balconies and private rooms that circled the high ceilinged main room. Those rooms allowed their occupants to watch the party down below or to opaque their windows for privacy. One of the private rooms full of rich boys either forgot to opaque their window or perhaps they preferred to let the crowd watch as they switched back and forth between snorting lines of coke and getting blowjobs from the pretty girls in short dresses that the rich boys had invited up from the crowd below.

Gregory was a little shocked that the prim and proper young woman in his Senior English class knew of a place like this. Genuine honest-to-god decadence wasn't unheard of in Shin Tokyo, but it _was_ a damn sight harder to find than in most of the world's great cities, like Monte-Carlo or New York City or Hong Kong.

Thank goodness for MBI's Platinum Card! It opened doors _everywhere,_ even doors into rare Shin Tokyo debauchery! Gregory spent a moment wondering how much cocaine and opium the MBI Card was good for. Do dealers take debit cards these days? It had been decades since Gregory's last ventures into purchasing anything from the underground economy. Cautious purchases of small baggies of marijuana in college made for most of his experience.

At least Madoka did not seem to have noticed what was going on upstairs. Probably because she wasn't tall enough to see over the heads of the crowd. Gregory was glad of that, he didn't feel up to explaining what cocaine was or why sex on cocaine was sex on a whole different level.

Gregory, bemused by the loud crowd downstairs and the shocking activities upstairs, so unlike what he was used to in Japan, took Madoka's hand and navigated his way to their reserved small table near the main stage. Onstage, a pair of pretty girls was singing a credible cover of the K-pop group _Mamamoo's_ hit "Mr. Ambiguous".

At least that's what Madoka told him they were singing. Gregory had no clue; K-pop and J-pop were Madoka's favorite, not his. He'd _still_ not seen any results from his now-month-long effort at telepathically causing her to prefer 1970's era American Country and Western music. But he still dedicated time every day concentrating on it! If his desire for her to like country music wasn't affecting her, what desires of his were? With no way to really know, he kept on with his daily experiment on his Sekirei Plasticity Theory.

Gregory opened a tab at the bar with the MBI Card, mentally thanking that fucking lunatic Hiroto Minaka for taking care of their ¥20,000 each door charge as well as whatever their bar tab was going to ring up to. Scanning the long list of beers available Gregory gave in to his college years nostalgia and ordered himself a bottle of Miller High Life (the Champagne of Beers!) and at Madoka's request he ordered a "Vose's Psycho Killer" from the bartender. Where she had _heard_ of such a drink Gregory could not imagine, but the mix of Irish whiskey, Campari, banana, and cocoa nib was amazingly good.

He ordered one for himself after she'd insisted he try a sip of hers.

Sitting close together at their tiny table, Gregory read over the Karaoke menu with Madoka. She pointed to a list of songs by a certain Canadian mezzo-soprano singer/songwriter he had thought of the day they met and she smiled a wordless question at Gregory.

He leaned in to speak close to her ear, "If you want to, Mado-chan. That's pretty tough stuff to sing, eh?"

"Then I will, Ashikabi-kun. I made a point to learn all of the words while you were at work!"

Gregory leaned further down to kiss Madoka's bare neck. "Just remember, we can't kiss in this place, no matter what. Your wings lighting up the whole interior of this club would draw a lot of unwanted attention. So no getting carried away and running off the stage to kiss me on the lips!"

Madoka laughed and reached up and ran her fingers through his short-cropped hair and pulling his kisses harder against her neck. "I will remember, Gregory-kun! We will make up for it in one of the private booths here later!"

Gregory smiled against her immaculate skin, "I'll order the song. And a couple more of these 'Whatsit Pyscho Killer' drink things!"

It was a few more drinks before Madoka's turn on the stage came. Gregory was amazed at how little nervousness his blonde Sekirei showed after she kissed him on the cheek and then ran up onto the stage to the microphone stand. He figured _he_ would be drenched in flop-sweat if he had to try to sing in front of a crowd this large.

Hell, just the fact that it looked as though her father was escorting Madoka for the evening already made him feel self-conscious.

" _They're just a bunch of young people; none of them know you, and none of them really matter, Greg. Focus on what matters: Madoka."_

The club was full to capacity by this point and the door attendants had stopped letting anyone in, no matter how much the prospective patrons complained about being left outside in the winter cold. Gregory glanced around, noticing there was not an empty seat anywhere. So far all of the singers had been good, though a few had been laughably bad and everyone had fun cheering them along in spite of their lack of talent.

The lights went down and a single spotlight illuminated the center of the stage where the tiny blonde Anglo girl was holding the microphone. This was the usual lighting for when the slower, ballady, songs were selected, and Gregory straightened in his chair to listen. He'd heard Madoka sing to herself occasionally, not to mention clearly remembering her singing part of the chorus of "Never My Love" into his ear just a month ago _as an argument rebuttal_. He figured she'd be smashing at this but the only way to know was to actually try it.

From the first note of Sarah McLaughlan's "I Love You" that Madoka sang, breathless and soft, pitch perfect and earnest, Gregory couldn't stop smiling.

After Madoka's performance onstage, Gregory had to educate her on how to go about declining the drinks that were now being offered to her by other men, of which there were a great number trying to do just that. He explained why they were offering her drinks, and he was thankful that at a club like this the offers came by way of the waitress instead of the fellow actually walking over to their table with an extra drink in hand. He explained that she did not have to accept the offered drinks, and in fact should not accept the offers because there was an implicit invitation to at least join the other man at his table or let him join her at her table. She was utterly shocked at even the idea; she couldn't believe anyone would expect her to treat her Ashikabi in such a way! Or that any human girl would treat their date that way!

Gregory took it all in good humor, though Madoka was offended on his behalf at first. His uncomplaining demeanor convinced her she too should take this sort of thing in stride; perhaps she should even accept the offers as the flattery they were intended as even though she declined the drinks and the implicit suggestion of joining the other man. She never got that far; she still felt slightly offended that Gregory would have to put up with other men blatantly trying to tempt her away from him. But she did soon figure out how to best tell the waitress "no thanks" without feeling obligated to accept the offered drinks when yet another offer was sent to Madoka from some smiling, hopeful, young man across the bar. It wasn't long before Gregory, Madoka, and the three girls sitting at the next table over were laughing and making bets about how many more "Vose's Psycho Killers" would be offered to Madoka before the night was out.

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

An hour after her first turn on stage Madoka sang a second song for the crowd. She had not planned to do so; the first time she had been quite nervous and she had barely managed to force herself onto the stage. It had taken every trick of self-Redaction she had learned to keep her expression confident and to keep her hands from shaking as she had held the microphone.

It only took the first few notes of that Sarah McLaughlan song for her to know she had it right though. She could _feel_ Gregory's enthusiasm and happiness through their bond, and then she could sense the approval of the crowd. She had then been able to relax, been able to breathe properly, and she had sung the pretty, gentle, love song with confidence and courage.

The crowd cheered wildly at the end. The transition from the almost total silence from the crowd as she sang the last note to the loud applause and yelling approval of all these people after that last note faded had startled her badly and she had run off stage to the shelter of Gregory's arms, which made the crowd cheer and laugh even louder. Once she realized what was going on she laughed at herself, her face pressed against Gregory's chest and blushing.

The second song she picked from the table's menu display while Gregory was off to the bathroom. She had been casually flipping through the extensive menu and saw a song she'd listened to on the new media server at the loft just this week on a random impulse. So she ordered the song and returned to happily chatting with the girls at the table next over from her and Gregory's, girls who had performed a really good version of the old song by _The Three Degrees,_ "When Will I See You Again".

When her second song came up, she kissed her Ashikabi on the cheek for good luck and bounced up onto the stage again. Gregory was caught by surprise; he hadn't known she'd even ordered a second song. The shock she felt from him through their bond when the song began just made her smile wider and put even more into singing it.

The crowd loved it and cheered her on throughout her performance. By the time she made it back to their table, she decided she very much liked karaoke. They should do this more often!

As she gulped down the half-a-glass worth of Vose's Psycho Killer that she'd left on their table (she'd looked up bar drinks on The Google before they left the loft so that she would know at least one thing to order, and it was yummy!) she watched Gregory over the rim of the glass. He was sitting in his chair, gaping at her.

After her drink was gone, and she'd waved to the waitress to bring her another one, Madoka turned to Gregory and leaned over, "What is it, Gregory-kun? Did I not sing it right? What is the matter?" Gregory was still gaping at her. She reached over and poked him in the arm, "Hey! No looking like a dead fish with your mouth all hanging open! Did I sing the song wrong?"

"Mado-chan," Gregory leaned over closer so he wouldn't have to yell, "when the hell did you learn to sing 'Slow Hand' by Conway Freaking Twitty?"

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/  
\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

Thursday, February 20th 2020  
Ebisu District, Shibuya Ward, Shin Tokyo

Sanjunana: 76! Hello, 76, are you there?

||!GlaivesRAwesome!: yes! hi hi madoka-san! tell me how ur anniversary night out went im dying to hear about it! tell!

||Sanjunana: Oh, Midorino-san, it was so wonderful and a very nice two-month anniversary! I was so happy Gregory remembered. He is so thoughtful about things like that. The club he took me to is named Mado Lounge. How cool is that? And I sang three songs over the course of the night and all three of them the crowd loved and so did Gregory-kun! Though he was all funny about the two that I sang that were old American country songs. I do not know why. The crowd liked them a lot though! And we did not get home until midnight, poor Gregory-kun was still sleepy when he left for work this morning.

||!GlaivesRAwesome!: im so jealous of u, madoka-san! and u r winged to ur ashikabi for 2 months? me and kohaku-kun are only 2 weeks! that is so not fair! i havent gone ne where, we hav only bin stayin n the apartment n tryin 2 keep low cause kohaku-kun works every day all day. arent u worried about bng attacked?

||Sanjunana: Not really, Midorino-san. The Sekirei Plan is supposed to still be the First Phase, right? This is when we are all supposed to be finding our Ashikabi, getting to know them, and keeping the Sekirei Plan secret. The Professor was very clear about that in the briefing when he called us right after Gregory winged me. Fighting in the streets would bring the anger of MBI down on anyone who gave away the secret before the Second Phase starts. At least, that is how I understand it.

||!GlaivesRAwesome!: u are right! i hadnt thought of it like that! yes i remember the TV the professor appeared in kohaku-kuns apartment after i kissed kohaku-kun! and the professor told me and kohaku-kun we absolutely positively had to keep the sekirei plan super secret or mbi would arrange for something bad to happen to kohaku-kun at his work. that was the 1st time i had evr been mad at the professor so i remembr it very well. i thought i wuz just lucky and hadnt found ne sekirei 2 fight yet but if we are supposed 2 keep our existenc and the sekireipln secret ur right we shudnt haf 2 worry about bng attacked n public at least nt yet.

||Sanjunana: The only ones to worry about would be those who are breaking the rules and hopefully MBI is taking care of those and removing them from the game. Are you looking forward to the four of us meeting for lunch, Saturday? I know Gregory-kun and I both are.

||!GlaivesRAwesome!: yes very much! i spent sinc pubeadjust in group 4 and there waznt many other sekirei and all of us that were there had been taken from other groups any time we made friends and put in group 4 so no1 n group 4 made ne effort 2 make friends ne more. it was very lonely. now that ur gregory explained 2 kohaku-kun and kohaku-kun explaind 2 me y fighting the other sekirei is a bad idea i admit i am looking forward 2 meeting u and ur ashikabi gregory and hope that we can b good friends!

||Sanjunana: I have no doubt we will be, Midorino-san. And your Ashikabi Kohaku-san sounds like a wonderful guy. I hope all four of us can be good friends too!  
I have a question though, and don't take this wrong, but… what exactly is a glaive?

||!GlaivesRAwesome!: oh! that is my weapon u shud c it! it is so awesome! i will show u saturday if we go 2 the park like u said we might! i luv my glaive! it is MUCH MUCH better than an ax or sword! stupid sword users + spear users + fist types! i hate them soooooo much i hav my goal of proving them wrong n showing every1 that glaives are the best weapon ever! that is my dream!

||Sanjunana: … okay then! We will see you and Kohaku-san Saturday at 1 o'clock then.

Madoka closed the chat app on her phone and opened Google to search for "glaive". She also made a mental note to herself to never, ever, imply any other weapon was better than a glaive, at least where Midorino could hear her.

Weapon users and their fanatic attachment to their favorite toys! Crazy!

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/  
\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

Saturday, February 22nd 2020  
Shinjuku Ward, Shin Tokyo

Madoka waited for Gregory to show up at the Nishi-Shinjuku subway station, a few blocks away from where they were to meet with 76 Midorino and her Ashikabi for lunch at 1pm. He was supposed to take the train from Shinjuku Station near the O'Donnell apartment after his Saturday ESL class and meet her here.

She was wearing her pink jacket over a grey, long sleeve, cotton, V-neck, which was tucked into snug button-fly jeans. Since she and Gregory would be walking a lot today, to train stations and from train stations, she chose a comfortable pair of tennis shoes instead of her favorite black leather boots. Slung across her torso from one shoulder to the opposite hip she had Gregory's Nikon v10 bag with all the extra equipment he packed with it for the possible photoshoot at the Shinjuku Central Park. From the other shoulder hung her purse, with a hand on the strap at all times.

She'd had one purse stolen from her in Shin Tokyo. Never again!

"Mado-chan!" Gregory's voice caught her attention as he walked up the stairs from the subway platform to the street level. He was wearing his teacher jacket, shirt, and tie, but she thought he looked handsome anyway. She smiled and walked quickly to take her Ashikabi's hand and then stretch up on her toes to kiss him on the cheek. She had to be careful about kissing him on the lips in public places, at least until the Second Phase of the Sekirei Plan where secrecy wouldn't be as big a concern.

"Hello, Gregory-kun. How was your day at school?" The two walked, hand in hand, out of the Nishi-Shinjuku station, crossed busy Honan Street the station was on, and then turned to walk along the sidewalk in the direction of Shinjuku Central Park, a few hundred meters to the east.

"It was good, really good. It's getting near the last month of this class so the adult Second Language students are fluent enough that it's not painful to have them speak English. Did you have any trouble with the train and subway trip from the safe house?"

She shook her head, "No, it was no trouble at all. I made sure to memorize the stops and transfers, so it was really straightforward. Only Shinjuku Station was tricky, but that station is always a maze."

"Yeah, I know what you mean, Mado-chan. Shinjuku Station is difficult even for me and I've gone through it many times in the five years I've lived practically next door to it. Busiest train station in the world."

The couple turned off Honan Street into a narrow back-street which would eventually lead them to the back of the restaurant they were meeting 76 Midorino and her Ashikabi at for lunch. Gregory felt that taking the back way and approaching the restaurant from the back gave her the best chance to scan for other Sekirei in the area to see if they were walking into a trap.

It was a pleasant walk, past small storefronts and a few tiny shrines. There were only a few other pedestrians and the occasional bicyclist to watch for, and the blue skies and cool February air made the day very nice.

After a few turns in their route along the back streets and as they were approaching the restaurant, they paused at the corner of a building and Gregory bent to retie his shoe. Madoka engaged her Farsight and scanned all around them, searching for other Sekirei.

Gregory asked, "Do you sense anything unusual? Can you tell if 76 is already at the restaurant?"

Madoka shook her head, "One winged Sekirei, ahead and to the right, about 30 meters that way." She pointed in the direction they both knew the restaurant was located. "So I am going to guess they have not set up an ambush with any other Sekirei. And both Midorino and her Ashikabi look like they are inside the restaurant waiting for us."

Gregory frowned and looked up and down the backstreet, then said, "Well, I guess there's no reason to back out now, is there? We've been as careful as we can be, if this is still an ambush then we will do our best to get away and out onto the busy sidewalks on the main streets and hope that discourages anyone from pursuing and breaking MBI's secrecy. So, you ready?"

She cancelled her Farsight and nodded, "Yes, Gregory-kun. Let us go and meet our first Sekirei and Ashikabi couple and hopefully make new friends."

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

"Hello, Hara-san, it's nice to meet you. I am Gregory O'Donnell, please call me Gregory." Gregory always introduced his name American style since it made the Japanese speaker prone to referring to him as Gregory-san instead of attempting the more difficult O'Donnell-san. "My compliments on your selection for our lunch today; barbecue is a good choice. And this place is right across from the Kumano Shrine and Shinjuku Central Park, so it was very easy for us to find."

He gestured to Madoka, who had one hand resting on his arm and her other hand was holding the strap for his Nikon v10 camera bag to her far shoulder. "And this is my lovely Sanjunana Madoka which you probably recognize from her portfolio of pictures." The other Ashikabi smiled a bit wider at that and Midorino playfully swatted his arm. Gregory and Madoka laughed along with the other pair's teasing. Gregory then shook the other Ashikabi's hand then offered his hand to the Sekirei. After a moment's hesitation the tall, lithe, Sekirei 76 shook his hand while blushing for some reason. All four smiled politely during their mutual handshaking and greetings while looking each other over.

Sekirei 76 Midorino appeared to be a little younger than Madoka's approximate 20 years of age. Call her… 17 years old, maybe? She was strawberry blonde and blue eyed, like Madoka, but Midorino was much taller, probably near 180 cm versus Madoka's 150 cm, so almost exactly one foot taller than Madoka. Midorino had a robust, strong-looking, body with modest B-cup breasts (at Gregory's best guess) as opposed to Madoka's shorter frame and aggressively feminine curves. She was _very_ pretty, with a face that had faultless bone structure. A smattering of freckles across her cheeks and nose complimented her strawberry blonde hair very nicely and was in contrast to Madoka's porcelain smooth complexion.

76 Midorino's eyes were striking; they were a lighter shade of blue than Madoka's and her eyes really drew the attention of anyone looking her way. They were definitely her most remarkable feature. Gregory's guess at her ethnicity would have been English or perhaps Welsh, if he didn't know already that she was a Sekirei. She was wearing a black leather jacket over a tight stretchy top, which had a low flat neckline that revealed most of her upper chest and probably had spaghetti straps over the shoulders. She wore tight black pants of a slightly shiny material, the legs of which were tucked into calf-high leather boots that matched the leather jacket.

Resting on the bench between her and the window was a five-foot long, hard-shelled, latched case with a handle. It probably contained the melee weapon Madoka had told him Midorino used.

If they went to the park for photos after lunch, Gregory was positive that he could get good photos of her in that outfit. He made a mental note to bring a cup of crushed ice on their walk in the park; that skintight elastic top with the assumed spaghetti straps over the shoulders was a _perfect_ opportunity for nipple bumps. She might not be that bold, but best to have some ice at hand if she turned out she was.

Hara Kohaku was a young Japanese man, perhaps 25 years old. He was almost as tall as Gregory but like many tall Japanese men he seemed to have never grown out of the awkward, lanky, stooped over, stage. Gregory understood the most common cause; it was rarely a positive thing to stand out in Japanese schools, so males who were taller than usual tended to stoop in order to blend in with the crowd. Japanese public education culture exemplified the concept of "the nail that stands out most gets hammered hardest". Kohaku was wearing a decent black suit, white shirt, black tie, all well pressed and clean, the universal uniform of the Japanese salaryman. Gregory noticed a college class-ring on the young man's hand, so he was likely a recent graduate just starting out on the career ladder in his chosen field.

"Please, call me Kohaku, Gregory-san. It is a pleasure to meet you."

"Thank you Kohaku-san, and your lovely Nanajuroko Midorino, for meeting Mado-chan and I for lunch."

Friendly smiles and nods all around as the four of them took their seats at the table; Gregory and Madoka on one bench facing Kohaku and Midorino on the other bench. The girls were seated next to the window looking out at the beautiful Kumano Shrine across the wide street. The two Sekirei were quiet, which did not particularly surprise Gregory. New social situations were usually the man's job to navigate in Japan; the Sekirei would probably follow his and Kohaku's lead until the ice was broken.

Orders were quickly placed with the waitress and the table fell into an awkward silence. Gregory chuckled and asked Kohaku directly, "Can we pretend that we've all been very very polite and now we can move on to where we can all relax and get to know each other over our lunch? We can blame my rude Americanness for moving forward so quickly if you'd like, I truly don't mind."

Kohaku relaxed his shoulders and leaned forward, seeming relieved that Gregory was pushing for a more informal atmosphere. "Oh, thank you, Gregory-san. I am required to have lunch with my very stuffy superiors at the office six days a week; being able to relax at lunch will be a treat. And whether your Americanness is rude or not I couldn't say, but your Japanese is amazingly good. My compliments, you must have put a great deal of effort into learning our language so well."

Gregory smiled at that, as did Madoka. "I would hope I had fluency at this point, Kohaku-san; I teach High School Senior English at Tokyo Metro High in Shibuya Ward. Being as accomplished with Japanese as I am with my native English is a requirement for the job. But thank you for the compliment; it _did_ take years of focused study to get to this point, that's certain."

The other Ashikabi shook his head, bemused. "I don't think I'd have the courage to move all the way to the other side of the world for a job, even if I had the drive to master their language. How long have you been here?"

"Five years, going on six. I enjoy teaching High School English, it's much less stressful than the full time Adult Education teaching that most Westerners take up when they decide to try teaching as a way of getting an extended visit to Japan."

Gregory and Kohaku discussed their respective professional lives (Kohaku was, in fact, a salaryman working for the Tokyo Metropolitan Government in the Code Compliance department) while their Sekirei began their own whispered conversation. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government had its main offices on the opposite side of Shinjuku Central Park from the barbecue restaurant they were sitting in, which was why Kohaku was familiar with this particular eatery. Gregory could see the distinctive dual towers of the enormous Tokyo Metropolitan Government skyscraper, stretching up above the winter trees of the park across the street, when Kohaku pointed them out.

"Though I assure you my own cubicle is nowhere near the floors that you can see over the trees from here. I suspect they would put those in my humble strata in the basement if it were practical."

Gregory laughed, deciding that he liked Kohaku's unassuming, self-deprecating, humor; Gregory had much the same tendency. The other Ashikabi seemed remarkably open and friendly, which in turn allowed Gregory to relax and be friendlier, himself.

After their orders arrived, the four enjoyed spending several minutes roasting the sliced cuts of beef on the grille in the center of their table. Gregory spent a few minutes commenting on the differences between Japanese (and Korean) yakiniku barbecue and barbecue in the U.S. "I love yakiniku barbecue, but I do sometimes miss the simplicity of a chopped brisket sandwich piled high with pickles and onions with a spicy barbecue sauce dripping from the meat."

Kohaku commented, "I would love to try American style barbecue, I don't think I've ever had it. Is there anywhere in Tokyo you know of which serves that style? I picked this place because barbecue was always my favorite food, going back to my childhood. A new barbecue style sounds like a great idea to try!"

"American style barbecue is very uncommon in Shin Tokyo but yes, there is a place, not too far from where we live in Shibuya Ward, in Jingūmae district as a matter of fact. Just a few blocks away from our favorite Starbucks, Mado-chan." Gregory gestured for the server to bring refills for their drinks, then he continued, "I believe they claim to be Shin Tokyo's first 'authentic' barbecue restaurant and they only opened in 2013, so there aren't many restaurants in Shin Tokyo that serve that sort of food. The name of the place is 'Smokehouse' and they serve a passable Kansas City style American barbecue. They mostly serve pork and chicken, instead of beef brisket, though their dinner menu has a few beef brisket items. Sure, it's the sort of trendy Shibuya Ward restaurant, near the Omotesandō, where a plain cheeseburger will set you back ¥1600 and they offer items like smoked Norwegian salmon on the appetizer menu, but I can personally vouch for the quality and authenticity of their pulled pork, grilled chicken breast, and their beef brisket."

Gregory pulled his slices of now-cooked finely marbled beef from the grille in the center of their table and popped the first one into his mouth, chewing happily. "Ah. Talking about barbecue was making me hungry for barbecue."

Madoka paused in the rapid-fire conversation she and Midorino had been engaged in and giggled at him. "Gregory-kun, only you."

He grinned at his pretty, blonde, Sekirei, "It's a different kind of barbecue, really, Mado-chan! That's it, Kohaku-san, next meal we all share it's our MBI card's treat and we'll have dinner at Smokehouse so that the beef brisket will be on the menu and we can try everything on the menu!"

Midorino, who was outpacing Kohaku's grilling and eating by two to one (much like Madoka was doing to Gregory) clapped her hands excitedly, "Oh, can we, Kohaku-kun? Please?"

Kohaku looked at his Sekirei with the same sort of hopelessly indulgent expression that Gregory usually wore when Madoka asked for anything. Gregory noticed this and grinned over at his own Sekirei, figuring it was a sure thing the foursome would be having dinner at Smokehouse soon.

Once Gregory and Kohaku had their fill of yakiniku barbecue, and the girls were still going strong, grilling and eating a second full order of beef slices, Kohaku brought up the Sekirei Plan. "So, Gregory-san, I wished to hear your opinion on how we can survive this Sekirei Plan. I know we exchanged…"

Gregory reached across the table and placed a hand on Kohaku's arm and shook his head. He took his cell phone from his jacket pocket and gestured negatively at the phone. Kohaku nodded his understanding and commented "Ah. It is like that?"

"Perhaps. It's hard to know for sure, but…" Gregory smiled apologetically at Kohaku for cutting him off as he had. He pulled an ink pen from an inside pocket of his jacket and quickly wrote on a napkin " _Avoid talking about the Plan or MBI until we are all away from our phones and other likely listening devices."_ He slid the napkin over for Kohaku to read, and then passed his pen over to the other Ashikabi at Kohaku's request.

Kohaku wrote " _Agreed, and if we are concerned about MBI monitoring communications we should only be using encrypted chat and email. I know a web based service out of Canada that provides both through any web browser and which uses 256-bit public key encryption and it is cheap, only ¥3500 per year per account. I also could, if we needed, set up our own private OpenPGP mail and chat server, which would be even more secure_. _As in 'the American CIA could not crack the messages open' secure."_

Gregory read the note and smiled, adding to the napkin conversation, " _Brilliant! And very good thinking, Kohaku-san, I hadn't considered encrypted email and chat. I assumed such things would be difficult and technical but if there's a simple public key style web browser service? Yes!_ _Give me the name of that solution for now. I will set up accounts for Madoka and myself, and then you let me know what you and Midorino-san's usernames are there. We should probably make a policy of always using that service for communications other than the social media completely-for-public-consumption stuff. Maybe your private system will be needed in the future but for now let us go for ease of use over worry about court orders to the web hosts in Canada. Once we have secure communications I've got quite a lot of information to give you, mostly techniques on security, how to use the MBI Card effectively and securely, things like that."_

Kohaku read what Gregory wrote and then nodded agreement. Gregory handed the other Ashikabi a business card from his wallet and Kohaku wrote down the information for the web-based encrypted email and chat system on the card's back and then slid the card back across the table to Gregory.

Gregory placed the now-heavily-ink-covered napkin on the grille in the middle of the table where it quickly flared in yellow flames and was consumed. The smoke flue, directly above the grille at every table, connected to the ventilation system in the ceiling, easily took away the paper's smoke. Gregory apologized profusely to the waitress and to the day manager of the restaurant, both of whom had been alarmed at the quick flare of the napkin burning. "I am very sorry; my clumsiness is entirely at fault. It was only a paper napkin, so no need for concern. Truly, I apologize."

The two Ashikabi grinned at each other after the waitress and the manager departed, and then Gregory commented in a low voice, "You know, Kohaku-san, I never considered before how handy the grille on the table is for things like that."

Kohaku laughed, "Indeed, Gregory-san! I too have never considered the secret utility of the barbecue grille fire! You know, Gregory-san, I think this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship, yes?"

Agreeing with the younger man and now of the opinion that Kohaku had likely felt as though he had been in "over his head" with the Sekirei Plan and his new live-in-girlfriend, having a work schedule that was far more demanding than Gregory's was and he had much less time to think and plan than Gregory did. With Gregory and Madoka offering friendship and someone to conspire with against MBI and other, hostile, Ashikabi/Sekirei groups, Gregory could see the relief on the younger man's face.

Overhearing something from the two Sekirei's conversation, Gregory turned his attention to their Sekirei. "Hold on, Midorino-san, what's a glaive?"

Kohaku facepalmed and groaned, "Oh no, Gregory-san! Don't get her started!"

Gregory and Madoka both laughed as Midorino smacked her Ashikabi on the arm repeatedly. She pushed Kohaku to get him moving off the bench and insisted "Let's go Kohaku-kun, let's go to the park! I want to show Mado-chan…" and here the tall, blonde, number 76 lowered her voice in a stage-whisper, "… the you-know-what! In the case! My glaive! You know! Oh, and to get some pictures! Like Mado-chan has!"

Laughing along with Madoka and Kohaku at Midorini's less-than-effective efforts at discretion, Gregory then told the others he'd meet them out front of the restaurant after he settled the bill. He held up the MBI Card so that Kohaku understood there was no obligation to try to pay for "their half" of the lunch or anything of that sort.

Collecting the Nikon v10 carrying case this time so that Madoka wouldn't need to burden herself with the bag, he went to the register stand to pay the bill. Kohaku escorted Madoka and Midorino outside where they loitered on the sidewalk. Gregory watched the three through the tall window next to the restaurant's door, glad to see Madoka smiling and seeming to genuinely enjoy Midorino's brash and maybe-a-bit-airheaded company.

Madoka also appeared to be making an effort to engage Kohaku in conversation, which encouraged Gregory. It had been difficult, as they had talked about the lunch date and made contingency plans before they arrived, to convince her that it really was okay for her to talk to another Ashikabi, just like talking to a regular person! Indeed, Gregory _wanted_ her to talk to both Midorino and her Ashikabi. He didn't want her to be silent, seen-and-not-heard, and only speaking to the other Sekirei and avoiding speaking to the Ashikabi.

Japanese culture was frustratingly regressive when it came to an attached female interacting with a new male acquaintance, even in casual situations and among the younger generation.

It was something Gregory made note of and promised he would try to get Madoka to _truly_ believe that she had just as much right to strike up a conversation with someone, with anyone, as he did. Gregory respected Japanese culture; he found it delightful and dignified. However, he respectfully _disagreed_ with how that culture treated women. So he insisted to Madoka that it _wasn't_ improper for her to carry on a conversation with Kohaku-san, or anyone else, male or female. She was as much a free adult person as _he_ was.

He figured it would be an uphill battle that took some time to make progress on; she really was soft spoken and reserved in public. Except for her new inclination towards a bold exhibitionism that he found very entertaining.

Declining a receipt for the lunch, he thanked the manager for the restaurant's hospitality and left to join the others, shouldering the carrying bag for the Nikon v10. It was sunny out and just an hour past noon; he would definitely be able to get some nice pictures at the park of Midorino if that was what she and Kohaku wanted.

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

An hour later, after the foursome had walked about Shinjuku Central Park and spent some time taking photos of Midorino and a few of Kohaku and his Sekirei together, Madoka called out, "Gregory-kun, I am going to take Mido-chan to the Forever 21 just down the street. We will be back quickly, she wants to get more photos but in a different outfit."

"Sounds good, Mado-chan. We'll wait here, if that's alright with you, Kohaku-san?" Gregory put the lens cap on the Nikon and looked over at Kohaku, who was sitting on a park bench behind Gregory, watching him shoot pictures of Midorino.

The younger Ashikabi nodded, "Sure, that is fine. Do please hurry though; don't leave us sitting here for an hour while you two get lost in clothes shopping." Kohaku grinned at Midorino. "I know how you can be with clothes."

"Mah mah, we'll hurry!" A visibly and obviously very happy Midorino ran over and kissed her Ashikabi on the cheek then waited as Madoka kissed Gregory on the cheek, then the two Sekirei took off towards a clothing store that neither man could see but had no doubt that the two females had sensed, through metapsychic or feminine powers, they couldn't guess.

Gregory pulled the Nikon and its tripod over next to the park bench and made sure he had all the rest of his photography paraphernalia out of the walkway, and then he sat on the bench next to Kohaku. Gregory pulled his own phone from his jacket, held it up for Kohaku to see, then pulled the back off the phone and removed the battery. Gregory then put his phone and the battery in separate jacket pockets then nodded to Kohaku.

The other Ashikabi got the picture, removing the battery to his own cell phone and putting them away. As soon as he had done so, Gregory said, "There's no way to know how much reach MBI Intelligence has, that's the problem. Can they monitor the GPS locations on all of our phones and other GPS capable devices, like my car? Maybe. Can they listen in on conversations by hacking your phone so that it acts like a bug you carry with you everywhere? Maybe. There's just no way to really know for sure. So, Kohaku-san, what Mado and I try to do is be paranoid but not too paranoid. There's a point of diminishing returns, you know? If you take it too far you're living in the sewers under the city wearing a hat made out of tin foil to protect yourself from the mind control lasers."

Kohaku chuckled at that. "That's a good point, Gregory-san. And I'd bet there are a lot of aspects to this whole crazy situation that you've thought out that I've not had a chance to even consider yet. I just met Midorino two weeks ago, you said you've been involved in this for over two months?"

"Yeah, it was two months ago last Wednesday that I winged Madoka. Just before Christmas, actually. It's been… well, it's been pretty crazy. But we've tried to spend time thinking of how to stay out of MBI's sight or at least make it so MBI's files on us are filled with inaccurate information. I don't think anyone is going to actually hide from them, they can afford to hire the best private investigators and security firms in the country. If they want to put a team of experts staking out your apartment and your workplace and tailing you everywhere you drive, there's nothing people like you or I are going to do to avoid that."

"Yeah, very true." Kohaku sighed and took a can of green tea from the small cooler he and Midorino had brought along for the park visit this afternoon. "So, give them misinformation through the channels that we assume they are watching. Things like GPS tracking, cell phone locations, where the MBI Card gets used. And your suggestion about daily ATM withdrawals is a very good one, that will give us, eventually, a non-traceable source of funds to do things like rent secondary places to live or hide. Thanks for that suggestion, that will help me and Midorino out greatly."

"Sure, no problem, Kohaku-san. I know this all hit me like a ton of bricks and it took me weeks to wrap my head around the craziness that's now a part of my daily life. And I'm lucky enough to not have a seven day a week job like you do." Gregory looked at the younger man sympathetically.

Kohaku snorted, "Yeah, I'm lucky if I get a Sunday off. Most weeks I can count on at least a half day Sunday and all day Saturday. That's why I don't have a girlfriend or wife. Well, not until now I guess." Kohaku shook his head and leaned forward on the park bench, resting his elbows on his knees. "I certainly wasn't expecting to suddenly have a live-in… whatever this is."

Gregory grinned sardonically, "Yeah, that part of it sure caught me off guard too. Forgive my bluntness on the subject, Kohaku-san, but what do you know about how the Sekirei view their relationship with their Ashikabi?"

Looking down at his hands rolling the can of green tea back and forth between his palms, Kohaku shook his head and replied, "Not as much as I'd like. Midorino said something about us being partners forever and ever, but I don't really know what they mean by that. And I get the impression there's more to it than this stupid fighting tournament thing. And… well… eh…"

Gregory chuckled, "Yeah, Midorino's been coming onto you, right? Making hints about making your relationship a romantic or physical one?"

Kohaku looked over at Gregory, surprise on his features. "Yeah. How did you know? Oh, same thing with you and Madoka-san?"

"Well, kinda. Mado-chan and I moved past that point quite a while ago. And you're wondering if there's anything wrong with taking your relationship with Midorino to that stage, am I right?"

"Yeah, exactly." Kohaku sighed. "So, that's the kind of relationship Sekirei want with their Ashikabi? It's not just some partnership in a fighting tournament; it's a… mate relationship?"

"Pretty much. They aren't here to fight to the death until only one is left, Kohaku-san. That's something that fucking lunatic Hiroto Minaka came up with and MBI has brainwashed the Sekirei into. As far as I can tell their main goal is to find their Ashikabi and establish this lifetime mate bond. And probably reproduce, though from everything I can tell MBI has stopped any Sekirei reproduction for at least the expected duration of the Sekirei Plan." Gregory leaned back on the park bench and watched the few other park visitors enjoying the sunny day. "So, if you're worried that you're taking advantage of Midorino by taking her to bed, you're not. In fact, quite the opposite. If you resist and fight her off you'll upset her. There's more to this Wing Bond than just that first kiss. The closer and more genuine your relationship is with your Sekirei, the stronger the bond seems to be and, perhaps, the stronger your Sekirei is as well."

Kohaku thought about that for a moment, then said, "Okay. I think I can figure it from there. Thank you, Gregory-san. I can't tell you how grateful I am to have someone to talk about that with; it's really been stressing me out."

Gregory nodded, "I can imagine. Trust me, there's no reason to try to be all noble and monkish about your relationship with your Sekirei. That's not what she wants. I guarantee it."

Smiling, Kohaku nodded back. "Good! Okay, what about the Sekirei Plan itself and MBI? We'll be able to communicate securely once we all get encrypted email and chat accounts, but is there anything you need to tell me now, while we're probably not being listened to?"

"Yeah, several things. Let me knock them out while we have the chance." Gregory began ticking off numbers on his fingers, "First, how to abuse your MBI Card, you've got that now from our talk earlier. Second, being aware of GPS tracking on your phones and cars and their tracking of your bank accounts and they'll be watching for unusual phone traffic to distant relatives and friends. Third, get yourself and Midorino a box full of burner phones with prepaid data plans, swap them out any time you suspect that phone may have communicated with someone who's phone is compromised. We will be able to use those in conjunction with the encrypted email and chat service you recommended for as close to foolproof communications as we're likely to find. Fourth, find a place to rent, prepaid cash, and at least get food and such laid up there so you and Midorino will have a safe place to hide out if necessary. Fifth, make sure you don't just disappear from MBI Intelligence's tracking efforts. It's a far better idea to keep sending data to them. Just be sure it's invalid data."

Gregory paused for a moment in thought, and then continued, "You should know that while it's highly unlikely the Sekirei are really aliens, like the girls think they are, they do absolutely have abilities that are outside of what normal humans have. That part of it is real. I've been doing as much methodical observational science as I can with only having one data source, Madoka, but yeah, there's genuine more-than-human abilities here. I've got a lot of notes on it, what we're calling metapsychic abilities. If we can add some additional data from Midorino-san that would help a lot. Once I have the encrypted email set up I'll email you what I've got, until we have a foolproof secure way to communicate we're pretty limited. So I'll absolutely set up those encrypted email and chat accounts for myself and for Mado-chan. Earlier you mentioned that you studied statistical analysis at Tokyo University?"

"Yeah," Kohaku replied, "I received my degree from the Graduate School of Mathematics at Tokyo University."

"Awesome." Gregory smiled, "That's really helpful; statistical analysis and data collection really isn't something I'm an expert in. I've quizzed Madoka in detail about the studies MBI was doing with the Sekirei during all the years they had the Sekirei imprisoned and it seems like MBI wasn't doing research on the Sekirei's metafunctions either. They were mostly focused on how to brainwash the Sekirei into participating in this stupid game. And yes, if you're thinking that doesn't make any damn sense at all, I'll agree with you, wholeheartedly. Kohaku-san If I send you some data to analyze and if you can put it into some sort of order that makes sense, that would be a huge help to my basic, fumbling, efforts to quantify what we're dealing with here. And unless we understand the true abilities of our Sekirei and things like the nature of the Wing Bond, it'll be damn hard to make good plans for the future."

Enthusiastic agreement from Kohaku lifted Gregory's spirits. The younger man said, "I'll be glad to help in any way I can. I'm busy with my job so much but I'll find the time to help as much as I can, Gregory-san."

"Good, thank you, Kohaku-san, that's all anyone can ask." Gregory spotted Madoka and Midorino across the busy street from the park, carrying a few bags and heading back towards their Ashikabi. "One last thing. A strategy for surviving this crazy shit. The best idea I could come up with was reaching out to other Ashikabi before they get sold on this 'fight fight fight until only one remains' bullshit, and convincing _them_ to convince their _Sekirei_ that genocide is a bad thing. Then we make alliances among the Ashikabi and Sekirei pairs in the west, here, so that we can all call upon each other when needed and so we can hopefully convince any gung-ho combative Sekirei to take up residence in other parts of the city. Let them be someone else's problem while all of us in the west cooperate and watch each other's backs as much as possible."

Kohaku agreed, "Gregory-san, I think that's the best idea we are going to come up with. Even if we thought our Sekirei could win this tournament that doesn't change the fact that it's immoral. I mean, it doesn't get much worse than genocide. It's… it's terribly crazy that Minaka and MBI think anyone is going to go along with this. The Sekirei they brainwashed, okay, but all of the Ashikabi? But if we all cooperate and ally with each other hopefully we can be safe, for now at least, from MBI Enforcement and from the other, hostile, Sekirei and Ashikabi who've compromised MBI Intelligence, like that Higa Izumi guy you told us about."

Gregory offered his hand to Kohaku. As the younger Ashikabi took the offered hand and shook it, Gregory said, "Then we'll consider you and Midorino our first allies, Kohaku-san. You two can call on us any time and we'll do our best to be there for you in any need you have."

Kohaku nodded, "Same here, Gregory-san. Thank you, this has really taken a load off my mind."

"Good, me too, Kohaku-san. Now, our beautiful girls are almost back and it looks like Mido-chan has changed into new clothes so, with your permission, I'll go take even more awesome pictures of her for you and for the social media page."

With an only slightly embarrassed expression, Kohaku nodded agreement and stood next to Gregory, watching their Sekirei walking towards them. "To be frank, I didn't believe you at first but it is as you said, Gregory-kun. It does seem that if I approve of something she approves too. Those pictures you took with the ice and the, um… her…um…"

"Nipples, Kohaku-san. They're called nipples." Gregory grinned over at the other Ashikabi as he picked up the Nikon and its tripod, preparing for more shots of Midorino and hopefully a few of Madoka as well today. "Like I told you earlier, the Ashikabi wield a great deal of influence over their Sekirei, more than what you'd normally see in a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship. More than in a husband/wife relationship, for that matter. You wanted her to pose and have fun, so she did. We need to be aware and use that influence carefully, Kohaku-san. These girls have had terrible, hard, lives, with grim futures if MBI has anything to say about it. If we, as their Ashikabi, can influence them to be happy and to have fun with their lives, we're doing a good thing, the way I see it."

Gregory was not going to tell Kohaku everything he had discovered about Sekirei Plasticity, not yet, but he had told the younger Ashikabi that if Kohaku really wanted Midorino to pose for sexy photos she would go along, probably eagerly.

Kohaku had agreed to try. Sure enough, just as Gregory had predicted, when Kohaku encouraged Midorino to go along with Gregory and Madoka's ideas for awesome sexy Sekirei pictures, Midorino had jumped in with both feet, enthusiastically.

Kohaku laughed, still somewhat embarrassed. "Yes, just so, Gregory-san. Those pictures were… they were awesome! Mido-chan and I both trust you and Madoka-san, and your skill with a camera is obvious. We put ourselves in your and Madoka-san's hands. Please take care of us."

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/  
\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

Later that afternoon Madoka and Gregory were in the Jeep and heading to Minato Ward, to the east of their home in Shibuya.

They had bid their new allies goodbye and had returned to the O'Donnell apartment to grab their overnight bags. They then drove out on Prefectural Route 319, which would take them directly to where they had room reservations for this weekend at the Grand Hyatt Tokyo.

The Grand Hyatt was the cornerstone hotel of the Roppongi Hills pseudo-arcology where they had gone for karaoke earlier in the week. Having seen the luxurious, towering, Grand Hyatt last Wednesday as they walked to the Mado Lounge, they decided it _had_ to be next on their " _Every Weekend A New 5 Star Hotel_ " tour of Shin Tokyo.

Madoka made herself comfortable in the passenger seat of the Jeep after connecting her phone to the sound system and queuing up some music for the ride. With the baritone voice of Don Williams singing softly in the background, she turned to face Gregory.

"That went well, did it not, Gregory-kun? I will admit I was a nervous wreck at first, I just knew something was going to go wrong and Midorino and her Ashikabi would be luring us into a trap or something."

"It did go well," Gregory replied. "And I admit I was worried as well. But I really don't know what else we can do that's a better plan than trying to make friends and allies among the other Sekirei and Ashikabi out there, especially the ones who live in the west of the city. Thankfully it worked out okay this time, eh?"

She nodded agreement and then said, "It was fortunate that she and I sat across from each other at the restaurant. I was able to reach across and hold her hand while we were talking and it seemed natural."

"Exactly, Mado-chan. You did that so smoothly I didn't realize you'd taken her hand and I was watching for it. So, I got the signal from you that everything checked out okay, but did you get any details when you mind-walked Midorino when you were able to take her hand?"

"I read that what she and Kohaku-san were saying was the truth. She was just released from the MBI Sekirei Labs two weeks ago and that same day she ran into Kohaku-san and reacted to him strongly enough that she just kissed him out of the blue." Madoka smiled at the memory, which she had plucked from the other Sekirei's mind. "It was really very sweet the way it happened. But yes, she has been hiding in his apartment alone most days and he works almost all of the time so she is very lonely and she has been scared, too, about fighting more powerful Sekirei who might have their Ashikabi at hand to give them their Norito and so be able to defeat her easily."

Gregory snorted, "I can't imagine most Ashikabi are going to be cruising Shin Tokyo all day and night with their Sekirei, looking for other Sekirei to attack, you know? Damn near everyone in this city who's older than 17 works insane hours; my only working 5 days a week at the school and half a day on Saturday is considered extreme career slacking by the standards most Ashikabi are likely living by."

"I never realized how lucky I was," Madoka said. "I thought you had to be away a lot for your job but I see now that you really have a lot more time away from work to spend with me than someone like Kohaku-san has to spend with Mido-chan. But, anyway, the first thing I looked for in her mind was any clue they were setting us up for betrayal. And nothing of the kind was in her mind at all; they both seemed to genuinely be hoping to make allies to help them survive together, much like we are hoping."

"Thank God for that, Mado-chan. So, it seems like our tactics for this encounter worked out okay, this time. Circling the block on foot before the time we were scheduled to meet, you scanning for any other Sekirei in range before we committed to entering the restaurant, making sure there was only one winged Sekirei there and her Ashikabi. It all worked out so we knew what we were getting into before we couldn't easily back away."

She nodded, and then reached over to take Gregory's hand while they were on a straight stretch of road and he didn't need to shift the Jeep's gears for a bit. She just liked the feel of him being in contact with her anytime it was practical. "Yes, so we can write that down as our plan from now on any time we are going to meet with a new Sekirei. I do not know what range other Sekirei can detect me at, but I know that today Midorino did not know we were nearby, until we walked into the restaurant. Maybe I have better range at Farsense than the fighter types do?"

"Could be," Gregory replied. "It's certainly something we need to get more data on. If you can detect them long before they can detect you, that will help a great deal in keeping us safe. So, what else did you pick up? You were going to see if you could determine Kohaku's and Midorino's power levels and what metafaculties she had. Did you have any luck with that?"

"Yes, as soon as I saw them, and again several times during our afternoon. Let me look at my notes." Madoka let go of Gregory's hand and opened her phone to bring up her encrypted notepad app where she kept all of her notes. She also opened the file that had the terms and definitions she and Gregory had come up with over the last two months for discussing Sekirei metapsychic abilities. She still thought her Ashikabi was being far too detail oriented about the Sekirei's powers, more so than the scientists in the MBI Sekirei Labs ever seemed to be. But it made him happy so she played along.

"Mido-chan scans as a power rating 25. Compared to my rating of 40. She does get more of a boost to her rating from being in a Norito Boost State than I get, due to Kohaku-san having a higher power rating than you have. She jumps from a 25 to a 50 when she gets her Norito Boost."

"And your rating," Gregory added, "jumps from 40 to 52 with your Norito Boost, because I don't add as much as Kohaku-san does."

Madoka did not like what they were learning about the effects of more powerful and less powerful Ashikabi were on their Sekirei, but she could not argue with the results they had measured. She grudgingly agreed, "Yes, that is what it looks like."

"Hmmmm." Gregory considered the results for a few minutes then said, "Make sure we scan and record every Sekirei and Ashikabi we meet, okay, Mado-chan? We need facts to base our actions on and whether we like the facts or not, we still need them."

"Okay, Gregory-kun. Oh, and I received a message from Mido-chan, she confirmed that she felt her Norito Boost State wear off exactly one hour after she kissed Kohaku-san and got her Wing Flare, so it looks like one hour is the duration for the Norito Boost State, not just for me, but for all Sekirei likely." She might not like the facts and even though she did not agree with the numbers that were telling her that her Ashikabi was a poor choice compared to Kohaku, but she wasn't going to go against something her Ashikabi insisted was important.

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/  
\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

Saturday, February 22nd 2020  
Roppongi district, Minato Ward, Shin Tokyo

It was nearing midnight when the two lovers practically staggered into their room at the Grand Hyatt Tokyo. The dinner they had just been treated to sated even Madoka's appetite. Gregory swore he'd never had anything as delicious as the Matsuzaka tenderloin steak that the chef prepared for them at the hotel's outstanding Keyakizaka Restaurant.

Given that there were ten different top quality restaurants at the Grand Hyatt, Gregory guessed he and Madoka would be spending more weekends here, just to see if they were all as fantastic as the Keyakizaka!

The Grand King Suite they had for the weekend was larger than the suite at the Mandarin Oriental they'd enjoyed. Larger than the safe house loft for that matter! And this room was not the best in the hotel, there were several higher than the "mere" ¥100,400 a night room they'd manage to reserve, including the Presidential Suite which covered 260 square meters, or 2700 sq. feet, and would put you back a cool one-million yen a night.

Needless to say, that room wasn't available or they would be trying it out tonight. A million yen a night hotel room? Gregory's mind swirled at the concept. The room they were in was amazing already! Over 900 square feet of luxury and comfort with a view towards downtown Shin Tokyo in the northeast and every extra comfort and indulgence Gregory could conceive of.

The bathroom had a huge LED wall mounted TV! There was a 2-meter holotank in the "living room" of the suite! All of the furnishings were workshop crafted Italian brands! The limestone bath and rain shower were so decadent Gregory felt like he could die in that room and be content!

Gregory tried to tell the difference between _this_ five star hotel and the Mandarin Oriental's five star accommodations. Eventually Gregory decided he was just far too plebian to appreciate the fine distinctions. They were _all_ incredible as far as he was concerned.

But still, the Grand Hyatt Tokyo was now at the top of his list for the best hotels in Shin Tokyo, edging out the Mandarin Oriental by just an inch.

Gregory dropped his dinner jacket onto the couch and stepped out onto the balcony where he lit a cigarette. Madoka joined him there carrying a tumbler of scotch on ice for him and for her a glass of what looked like white wine.

After handing him the glass of whiskey, Madoka took one of his cigarettes for herself. He had chided her for picking up the habit, when he first saw her with a cigarette. But her insistence that her expected lifespan was optimistically measured in months, thanks to the Sekirei Plan, rather put a damper on his paternal scolding instinct.

After the two gazed out towards downtown Shin Tokyo, Madoka murmured, "See that extremely tall skyscraper, due south of the Imperial Palace grounds? The one standing off by itself a bit, none of the nearby buildings are close to rivaling it." She pointed and Gregory sighted along her dainty finger to see which of the many towering skyscrapers of Shin Tokyo she might be referring.

He nodded and said, "Yeah, I see it. That's one of the newer towers in the city, built in the last 10 years. Toranomon, or something like that? It's really impressive. Is it a good hotel you'd like to try?"

She shook her head and lowered her hand, "No. That's MBI's Shin Tokyo Headquarters, and yes, it's called Toranomon Tower. They own the entire building, I understand, built to Hiroto Minaka's specifications. But, no, I do not think I would like to stay there again, as I spent almost my entire life there or at the facility at Kamakura Island."

"Hmmm. Then our wonderful room here has a worse view than I thought it did. Having to look out at that fucking lunatic's home."

Madoka giggled at that and seemed to put MBI out of her mind for now. She stood next to him, leaning into his body for warmth. It wasn't so much cold as cool, but their room was on the 20th floor so it was breezy and it was nighttime in February. And the dress Madoka had chosen to wear tonight was delightfully backless.

Gregory put his arm around her as she snuggled in closer, and he smiled to himself. Delightfully backless indeed; he had been treated to so much lovely incidental Madoka sideboob tonight that he was impatient for dinner to settle so he could take his beautiful Sekirei to bed.

Still, something seemed… off, tonight. There was a vague tension in the air for which he could not identify the cause.

Madoka spoke up, breaking the silence on the balcony, "Does it not seem like something should be happening, Gregory-kun?"

Gregory responded with a nod and soft grunt of agreement. It _did_ feel like something should be happening and it was affecting Madoka too. Another luxurious hotel, another incredible dinner at a restaurant he'd never been able to enjoy before this whole Sekirei Plan thing fell into his life. The prospect of another night spent with his beautiful Sekirei in bed. He couldn't imagine a better place to be than right where he was.

Yet the atmosphere was still, pensive, and there was a sense that something was waiting to happen.

"It _was_ nice having lunch with Kohaku-san and Midorino-san today," Gregory ventured. "And we've now made our first official allies, so that's a positive event, right?"

Madoka agreed, "Yes, there is that. And we did get several very nice pictures of Mido-chan to post on the Sekirei Google+ group, as well as a few nice pictures of Kohaku-san and Mido-chan together. She is really pretty and took to having sexy pictures taken right away. I expected her to be more reserved for some reason but she just went for it as soon as I mentioned the ice and the nipple bump photo. It was all I could do to resist just jumping her cute little butt."

Madoka turned her face into his chest, blushing at the confession.

Gregory laughed, squeezed her shoulder, and replied, "Yes, she is very pretty and she takes a very good picture. I was impressed with how well you helped her with poses and with getting her ready for photos, Mado-chan. The two of us working together get far better results than if it were just me trying to convince a teenage Sekirei to put ice on her tits so I can take pictures of her nipple bumps sticking out in her shirt."

Madoka giggled softly against his side and nodded.

He continued, "I'll probably work on that tomorrow night, when we get back to the apartment." Gregory sipped his scotch and sighed, "Ahhh. But… yeah, it still feels like something is hanging over our heads, like something is supposed to happen."

A few moments of quiet later and she shrugged against his chest and then moved towards the glass door leading back into their suite. "We could have sex. That is something, yes, Gregory-kun?"

He grinned at her, "Why, yes, that _is_ something, Mado-chan. Let's do that!"

"Waahoo!" She smiled and cheered and then ran off to get dressed into whatever she had decided to let him tear off her in bed tonight.

Before she could get to her overnight bag Madoka's phone jingled in her purse. It was her original, non-safe, phone; they always carried those anytime they weren't going to or from the loft. It wouldn't do to let MBI's presumed phone-GPS-trackers think they never went anywhere at all. Besides, MBI knew very well exactly where they were this weekend since MBI was paying the bill.

She went over to the handbag and pulled out her phone, answering it, "Sanjunana Madoka, who is calling?"

Gregory slid the balcony door closed quietly behind him as he entered the room, waiting to hear who would be calling Madoka's phone. As far as he knew, no one had the number, certainly no one who'd call late on a Saturday night.

"YOSUGA! You are out? Yay! Where are you? Do not move! No, move, no, wait, hold on!" Madoka's excitement overran her brain for a moment, and then she remembered the plan she and Gregory had long come up with for when 44 Yosuga managed to contact her.

"Yosu-chan, do you see a train or bus terminal nearby? You see a train station? What does it say? Ochanomizu Station?" She looked towards Gregory who was already punching in the station name into the search on his phone.

Gregory called over to Madoka while grabbing his jacket, "North of downtown, on the Chūō main line. Akihabara, basically. Eight kilometers; 20 minutes from here in the Jeep."

Madoka nodded acknowledgement to Gregory then spoke into her phone, "Yosu-chan, listen to me carefully. There are Sekirei who know when and where some of us are released into the city by MBI and they ambush the newly released Sekirei. So hide but stay at or near the Ochanomizu station. Run to that station; I will come for you in maybe 20 minutes. Yes, yes, with my Ashikabi. We will be driving a big orange American car with a white canvas top, just watch the traffic on the street outside the train station. 15 minutes! Stay safe, Yosu-chan!"

Madoka took her own jacket from Gregory's hand and pulled it on as they went out the door towards the elevators. She excitedly yelled, "Oh, Gregory-kun! I just knew something was supposed to happen!"

\o\NGFOM4.3/o/  
\o\NGFOM4.3/o/

* * *

Songs mentioned in this chapter:

"Mr. Ambiguous" by the K-pop group Mamamoo.

"I Love You" by Sarah McLachlan. From her album "Surfacing".

"When Will I See You Again" by The Three Degrees.

"Slow Hand" by Conway Twitty, from the album "Southern Comfort". Originally recorded by The Pointer Sisters as an R&B song.

* * *

From the Notebooks of Gregory O'Donnell

_**The Sekirei** _

**_Sekirei Plasticity_ **

I can report that my initial test of my Sekirei Plasticity Theory _**has succeeded!**_ As of 19 Feb 2020, Madoka now chooses to listen to 1970's and 1980's Country and Western music (henceforth "Urban Cowboy Country") by preference _over_ J-Pop and K-Pop. Urban Cowboy Country is not the _only_ music she selects for her own enjoyment but there is a definite preference on her part for this genre of music now.  
Whereas prior to 21 Jan 2020 (initiation of my first efforts at deliberately wishing for my Sekirei to prefer Urban Cowboy Country music over other genres) she had never selected anything except J-Pop and K-Pop.  
That it took a month (the test began on 21 Jan 2020) of 2 minutes of concentration on the "desire" every four hours (except while sleeping), or four to five 2 minute episodes per day, for results to show from my efforts could be due to many factors impossible to determine at this point.  
Some possible reasons for the time required for the test to prove positive:  
1) My own limited metapsychic potential (Madoka describes my baseline metapsychic rating as "1" with "1" being defined as "the minimum required to evoke any reaction at all from a Sekirei compared to what she remembers of Ashikabi Higa Izumi, who would carry a rating of 45, forty-five times my own metapsychic potential rating, see Notebook Entry: Metapsychic Potential Ratings in the next chapter);  
2) There could have been other, less conscious and deliberate, desires on my part which were given priority (see: notes on changes in Madoka's sex drive);  
3) The fact that she did not have easy _opportunity_ to discover this genre of music until we copied all of my existing media library from my family's apartment media server to the new media server at the loft (Friday 31 Jan 2020) which included many songs in this genre;  
4) Making any change to the psychology of a bonded Sekirei may simply take approximately 30 days;  
5) Some other unknown factors unguessable at this point.

I have not told Madoka about this test and its results yet. Partially because I would like to see how long it takes her to come across this information when she is casually reading my thoughts or memories as she is prone to doing when we are in close contact (without deliberate intent in many cases).  
And partially because if it were I who was being informed that my sovereignty over my thoughts and my mind may be less than absolute, I would find such a prospect terrifying, perhaps to the point of madness. Even now I shudder at the idea that I possess such influence in shaping the mind, the very being, of my Sekirei. The notion that I could reshape another sentient being's mind by mere wish or desire is _repulsive_ , _revolting_.  
Even _evil._ No one should have such power over another sentient being!  
How I would feel at the prospect of being on the other end of this level of such influence is beyond my ability to imagine.  
Hence my reluctance to speak with Madoka about this subject.  
There _are_ many elements of this Sekirei Plasticity that need to be determined and measured though. Is it unique to 37 Madoka? Obviously, I have only one subject to test so it is entirely possible that only 37 Madoka is subject to this influence, perhaps as a function of her rare Redaction metafaculty? But if so then many Sekirei could be stuck in bonds with incompatible Ashikabi. As the wing bond is purported to be (emphasis though on the unproven nature of the information we have on the matter) a permanent, lifetime, bond enforced by pain and perhaps even death for the Sekirei (but not likely for the Ashikabi), then Sekirei Plasticity may be a lesser evil than the alternative.

The prospect that MBI may have information on _how_ the characteristic of Sekirei Plasticity was engineered into the Sekirei is also horrifying in its implications. As the Sekirei are no doubt extremely compatible genetically (and if what Madoka has said about the Sekirei intending to breed with Terran humans they are by definition homo sapiens, thus genetically _identical_ to Terran humans except for whatever part of their genome defines their metapsychic abilities and possibly their "tama core", whatever that is) then MBI would have the potential to inflict the Wing Bond and the Sekirei Plasticity traits _on Terran humans_.  
I pray to God that this is not the case or at the _least_ that these traits are not inheritable! Please God let the Kouten have been wise enough to make the Wing Bonding and Sekirei Plasticity traits "run once then delete" elements of the Sekirei genome!  
If not then we could be witnessing the end of Act One of the story of the human race and the beginning of Act Two: the dominion over all of the human race unfortunate enough to qualify as a "Sekirei" by those who are genetically fortunate enough to qualify as an "Ashikabi".  
The only hope I can see would be:  
a) if the traits of Wing Bonding and Sekirei Plasticity cannot be inflicted on an already defined full genome (i.e., any point in a person's existence after the initial fertilization of the egg by a sperm) by various genetic engineering methods, and;  
b) these characteristics cannot be engineered into the parental gametes (the separate "half-of-the-recipe" contained in the egg and in the sperm) so as to breed for these characteristics in the next generation even though the current generation may be immune.  
But as 100% of the characteristics of a Sekirei is very likely defined by their genetics (i.e., are phenotypic traits just like blonde hair or the blueprint for a human liver), _including their trait of having potential for Wing Bonding and Sekirei Plasticity_ , _and_ their genetics are (supposedly) completely compatible with Terran humanity, I find myself unable to put much hope in either A or B above, at least not without engaging in extreme wishful thinking.  
It IS possible that the Kouten engineered these traits to only exist in the 108 Sekirei aboard their colonization ships, that these traits are NOT phenotypic traits.  
If that is the case, if the Wing Bond trait and the Sekirei Plasticity trait are _truly_ artificial and were attached somehow only to the 108 Sekirei (or 107 because 01 may be an exception to the rules for the unborn Sekirei), then there would therefore be little in the way of a Kouten _cultural foundation_ for the Ashikabi and Sekirei social structure. And according to Madoka there were indications that the Ashikabi/Sekirei social structure pre-dated MBI's meddling. In other words, this social structure is historical to Kouten and therefore a long-standing characteristic of their species or at least their culture.  
Mostly these hints or indications were from 02 Matsu, who would occasionally pass on knowledge of the Sekirei's nature to the younger inhabitants of the MBI Sekirei Labs, perhaps as a function of 02 Matsu's supposed knowledge specialty?  
If I get the opportunity to ask her, I will certainly do so. Unfortunately, she seems to have disappeared from the MBI Sekirei Labs over 10 years ago (best guess at the timeline).  
No, I am afraid the most likely scenario is that these two characteristics, with all their alarming implications, are indeed phenotypic traits encoded in the Sekirei's genome and that genome is 100% compatible with that of Terran human.  
And MBI has, at the _least_ , the knowledge that these traits _can_ be encoded in the homo sapiens genome.  
And knowing something can be done is a surety that it _will_ be done. If it is possible to encode Wing Bonding and Plasticity into the human genome… it will eventually be done.  
And that prospect will haunt me until the day I die.

**_Metapsychics_ **

**_Sekirei Power Ratings_ **

**OMPR** (Overall Metapsychic Power Rating)  
With a scan from a Farsensor Novice any persons overall metapsychic strength can be gauged. The Farsensor can usually determine the persons Native OMPR (the power rating they have naturally before any multipliers are enacted) as well as their Adjusted OMPR (the power rating after multipliers from factors like a Wing Bond to an Ashikabi, what the Ashikabi's multiplier is, and if the subject is in a Norito Boost state).

 **MfPR** (Metafunction Power Rating)  
A Farsensor Adept can scan for the individual power ratings of each of a person's metafunctions, whether the metafunctions are latent or operant. Both Native MfPR and Adjusted MfPR can be determined, as per OMPR above.

* * *

_From a recording of a conversation between Madoka and myself. I need to convert this to standard notation ASAP._

_Important Note: all of the following is highly speculative, since we only have two subjects to judge by, namely 37 Madoka and her Ashikabi myself, and 76 Midorino and her Ashikabi Hara Kohaku._

Madoka: "Starting with Kohaku-san and his ratings, because those have a substantial effect on Midorino's ratings in her Norito Boost State. Kohaku-san started out with a Native OMPR of 10, approximately 10 times your Native OMPR. After he Wing Bonded 76 Midorino his OMPR went up to 15, so there is definitely a multiplying effect the Ashikabi gets from his Sekirei and that effect varies depending on the Sekirei. Midorino appears to have a x1.5 multiplier she grants her Ashikabi, where I seem to have a x2 multiplier I granted you."

Gregory: "Mado-chan, it's damn handy you can see what their ratings were pre-Wing Bond as well as current. That gives us a lot more data to work from."

Madoka: "Yes, it is very handy. Since I could tell what Kohaku-san's pre- and post- Wing Bond OMPR was I could tell what 76 Midorino's Bonus to Ashikabi is. Same for you and I, so I could tell what my Bonus to Ashikabi is."

Gregory: "So, we now know that the Sekirei increases the power rating of their Ashikabi _and_ that the Ashikabi increases the power rating of their Sekirei by addition with the Norito Boost State. And we have a tentative idea of what both of those factors are. Midorino is a 1.5 multiplier for her Ashikabi, so as soon as she Wing Bonded to Kohaku his base power rating of 10 went to 15. Then his 15 power rating granted a plus 25 bonus to Midorino's various metafunction ratings when she's in the Norito Boost State?"

Madoka: "Right, just so, Gregory-kun. Based on the 1.0 OMPR we see for you and the 2.0 OMPR you have after Wing Bonding me. My power ratings on my metafunctions increased by 12 from a Norito Boost State. It seems our guess that the Ashikabi's bonus to the Sekirei is directly related to his effective OMPR was correct and that it is additive. Thank goodness it isn't multiplicative. That would get insane real fast."

* * *

This was the first evidence we had of how much a disadvantage I and my bare minimum metapsychic power rating was for any Sekirei that was Wing Bonded to me. My own OMPR and Ashikabi Additive would always be a fraction of what a more powerfully metapsychic Ashikabi could grant. Kohaku-san's native OMPR of 10 was not exceptional, yet due to starting out with a OMPR of 10 then getting his Sekirei's Bonus to Ashikabi of x1.5 resulting in him having an effective OMPR of 15. This gives his Sekirei an Ashikabi Additive of 25 across all of her abilities when they were in Norito Boost.

Compared to my own native OMPR of 1, then Madoka's x2 Bonus to Ashikabi giving me a OMPR of 2. This gives my Sekirei an Ashikabi Additive of only 12 across all of her abilities when in Norito Boost.

Tentative Formula for Ashikabi Effect for Wing Bonded Sekirei's Overall Metapsychic Power Ratings:

Ashikabi Additive to Norito Boost State = 10 + (Ashikabi OMPR)

Thus, for Kohaku:

\+ (15)= 25 Additive

For myself:

\+ (2) = 12 Additive

One can easily see that having multiple Sekirei, each multiplying their Ashikabi's OMPR by various degrees, would result in Sekirei who are substantially more powerful than the Sekirei who are bonded to lower powered and/or single Bonded Ashikabi.

* * *

Started June 1, 2015  
Completed June 20, 2015  
Posted Jun 21 2015

 


End file.
